Josef Goebbels, the Reich Minister of Propaganda from 1933 to 1945, was one of the core architects of the final solution. Propaganda played a significant role during the Holocaust era. It facilitated the evil work of the Nazi regime toward the destruction of one-third of the global Jewish population. The power of deception was prevalent throughout that era but was probably at its apex during the staging of the Theresienstadt Ghetto into a self-ruled Jewish town to fool the visiting officials from the Red Cross. The extent to which the Nazis went to stage a positive environment was very sick.
Theresienstadt was in Czechoslovakia, which was invaded by the Nazis in 1939. Soon after, Reinhard Heydrich re-opened a fortress previously used as a prison and made it into the Theresienstadt Ghetto. Many locations across Greater Europe served as holding/transit camps for Jews on their way to deportation and extermination in the death camps. Theresienstadt was such a place. During its use, the Ghetto was populated with a total of over 140,000 Jews, of which 35,000 died within its walls from starvation or diseases. 88,000 were put on cattle cars to Auschwitz and other Death Camps.
As Hitler was moving Jews to their death like cattle, he realized that quite a few famous and/or influential Jews were inside that ghetto, and he decided to use the location to stage a Jewish-run village and fool the world. It was 1943, and the rumors about the Death Camps had risen to a level that could have crippled Hitler’s agenda, so he had to do something. To dispel the rumors, the ghetto was quickly overhauled; vegetable gardens were planted, a coffee shop, a bank, a playground, a library, and many other locations usually found in towns and villages were staged, in many cases, using the inmate’s property. Plays and concerts were organized, but why stop there? It was decided that a movie would be produced and distributed to the right people around Europe to show them that the Jews were very well treated by the Nazis and that there was nothing to fear.
German Jewish film director Kurt Gerron was forced to direct the propaganda movie titled “The Fürher Gives the Jews a City.” With most of the “forced actors” in that movie, he was sent to Auschwitz and gassed not long after he had finished the project. The movie was never officially released because the war ended, and the ghetto was liberated. The world realized how far the evil of deception was willing to go to hide the truth. What have we learned from such a tragic event?
I cannot help but make a parallel with the way Hamas is releasing hostages from Gaza. It has been almost 500 days since Hamas invaded Israel, murdered 1,200 people, and took over 200 hostages. It is unknown how many of the 90+ hostages still in Gaza are alive today, as just a few are being released sporadically by Hamas as part of a ceasefire. The price is high and THIS IS NOT a hostage deal, but a ransom for Israeli lives, because Israel values life so much more than Hamas. In the words of former Israeli Prime Minister Golda Meir, “When peace comes we will perhaps in time be able to forgive the Arabs for killing our sons, but it will be harder for us to forgive them for having forced us to kill their sons. Peace will come when the Arabs will love their children more than they hate us.” […]
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