The descendants of a Jewish American serviceman stationed in Germany during World War II recently revealed previously unseen photos of the Nazis’ notorious 1938 pogrom.
By United with Israel Staff
On November 9-10, 1938, the Jews of Germany faced “Kristallnacht,” a vicious Nazi-led progrom in which scores were killed and tens of thousands were were shipped off to concentration camps.
“The government-coordinated anti-Jewish riots swept through virtually every town and city across Nazi Germany,” reported JTA this week. “Over several days, rioters destroyed hundreds of synagogues, looted thousands of businesses and killed at least 91 Jews; 30,000 Jewish men were sent to concentration camps.”
Ahead of this year’s memorials, a trove of never-seen before Nazi photos emerged, which were donated to Yad Vashem by the descendants of a Jewish American soldier stationed in Germany during World War II.
How the photos ended up in the soldier’s possession remains unknown, as “he never talked about them to his family,” reported the Associated Press (AP). These descendants also did not reveal the soldier’s name.
Yad Vashem
According to the AP, “The photos were taken by Nazi photographers during the pogrom in the city of Nuremberg and the nearby town of Fuerth.”
In one of the photos, Nazis can be seen stealing Jewish books, ostensibly for burning.
Yad Vashem noted that the photos document the German public’s knowledge of the violence. The Nazi authorities even arranged for regime photographers to record the atrocities.
The head of Yad Vashem’s photo archive, Jonathan Matthews, noted that the newly revealed photos further discredit Nazi propaganda that the murderous attacks were “a spontaneous outburst of violence,” representing instead a state-orchestrated campaign that launched the Holocaust, the Germans’ genocidal campaign that claimed the lives of 6 million Jews.