Greece

  • The title is taken from a  letter written by Marcel Nadjari ,a Jewish-Greek survivor of the Auschwitz-Birkenau. Marcel  was a member of the Sonderkommando in Birkenau from May 1944 to November 1944. The letter is an eye witness account of his experiences as a Sonderkommando in Auschwitz Birkenau. He had the task of of removing…

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  • Burnings of Kali Sykia

    On the morning of October 6, 1943, the mountain village of Kali Sykia fell completely silent. The men had vanished into the ravines; only the women, children, and the elderly remained. By nightfall, thirteen people were dead—trapped inside their own homes as the wood was barricaded from the outside and set alight. Twelve were women,…

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  • The Lingiades massacre

    The Lingiades massacre (also spelled Ligiades or Lyngiades) was a brutal war crime committed by Nazi German troops against the civilian population of the mountain village of Lingiades in northwestern Greece. On Sunday, October 3, 1943, German soldiers entered the village and murdered its inhabitants, leaving behind a scene of devastation that would become one…

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  • The Luftwaffe Holocaust

    It is a lesser-known, or perhaps lesser-acknowledged, fact that the entire Wehrmacht, including the Navy and Luftwaffe, was involved in the Holocaust. It wasn’t only the SS. The Luftwaffe was directly involved through bombardments and indirectly through experiments carried out on their behalf. The aerial bombardment of the village of Vorizia by the Luftwaffe is…

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  • Some people will probably accuse me of using specific words in the title as ‘clickbait’, and to an extent that is true. But anyone who writes a blog, and especially one with an extraordinary story, wants readers to click on that link to read that story. I make no excuse for using the title, basically…

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  • Massacre of Kondomari

    The Massacre of Kondomari  refers to the execution of male civilians from the village of Kondomari in Crete by an ad hoc firing squad consisting of German paratroopers on 2 June 1941 during World War II.The shooting was the first of a series of reprisals in Crete. It was orchestrated by Generaloberst Kurt Student, in…

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  • When discussing stories from World War II, the role of Italy is often overlooked, despite the fact that it participated in numerous battles and suffered many defeats. I believe that if Nazi Germany had not aligned itself with Italy, the outcome of the war might have been significantly different. The Battle of Fardykambos (March 4–6,…

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  • Industrial Murder

    One of the most disturbing aspects of the Holocaust is the “wholesale murder” approach the Nazis took, the industrialization of death. The gassing already started in 1939 as part of the T4 program, the murder of the disabled. What is really sickening is the fact that the first of such killings was at the request…

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  • Karl Schümers (17 October 1905 – 18 August 1944) was a high-ranking commander in the Waffen-SS and Ordnungspolizei (police) of Nazi Germany during World War II. He commanded the SS Polizei Division in July – August 1944. He was directly or indirectly involved in many of the major atrocities committed in Greece during 1944. Killed…

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  • Last night, during the Holocaust Memorial Day commemorations in London, Prince William delivered a heartfelt tribute to his great-grandmother, Princess Alice of Battenberg, in a moving speech. I wasn’t aware of his paternal great-grandmother’s involvement in the Holocaust. Princess Alice of Battenberg, a member of the British royal family and mother of Prince Philip, Duke…

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