Why did many victims of the Holocaust not resist?

Answer 1

There are many reasons:

Jews were generally well mannered, law abiding citizens.

The first and foremost being that unlike some events in history, there is not one defining moment that what was happening, or going to happen, really became clear. Over the course of many years, small steps were taken, and each one involved deceit. Many under the guise of doing things good for the Jewish society/people.

After being socially outcast, demorialized and literally beaten upon, in all ways, over the course of several years, while the Nazi regeme itself was gaining more and more power itself and over others, they were a rather downtrodden group. So when the government says, prepare to be relocated, for your own safety (so we can protect you from those buring your houses down for example), you may tend to believe it. At least want to. The relocation centers were extermination camps...but they weren't called that...sometimes because of how hard it is to deal with, they still aren't!

Any resisitance at any point was met with severe action - certain death - public ridicule and execution - for the one doing it...and most likely his family and friends. And maybe just for good measure...any instance of it required say 50 others to be executed openly as punishment for the group...that has the effect of not just dispelling people trying...but even making some turn them in out of fear.

And consider the US experience similar: The Balck activists gave the while bigots even more of a reason to hate...fear of theose lawless acts...buring of cities, etc. To them it just proved that the people were "animals". The great Martin Luther King (like Ghandi), showed a non violent approach helped disable the adversaries arguments. (However, the Jews were dealing with Nazi's at their height of power and had no MLK stepping up).

Remember, were talking about resisting...that is organizig and fighting...the well armed and trained Nazi powers in their already well occupied and controlled lands...something that would seem futile, even impossible...even when tried by well trained and supplied military forces - some even defending their own homelands with the support of everyone and thing there...was generally unsuccesful.

Just like people today try and make sense of this nonsencial situation....and compassionate people cannot come to terms with what happened....while it was happening...while the unbelievable was happening...it was yet harder to understand. People simply did not know - nor could they possibly be expected to believe - what lay ahead - even for themselves. The government hid (and denied any inference of) it's actions...

Once people are starved, and gone through years of hardship, their will to fight is broken...the promise of a potato in the "soup" that evening is enough to get submission...it takes energy to mobilize.

Answer 2 ?

I want to congratulate the author of what is above, which explains in detail the process used by the Nazis to submit human beings.

There was a time when some Jewish (Ben Gurion) claimed that the victims of the Shoah "deserved" their faith for not having resisted. The idea had its popularity among the Jews in the years of creation of Israel.

I feel annoyed by that question, by implying they could have a responsability, it can sound like a denial of the fact that the people who died in the death camps were the victims.

An answer could be another question : What would you do if men with guns threaten your life and your families' ?

To resist is easier to say than to do. Especially for a Jew in Europe in the 40's. Some had resisted in Eastern Europe (Warsaw Ghetto, in Czecoslovicia, in Hungary ...), but those resistances were wipped up.

Answer 2

I wonder what sort of resistance you have in mind. Demonstrations and riots were not tolerated in Nazi Germany ... The police opened fire, without warning on demonstrators.

Answer 3

Because they were over powered and slaughtered in the night or taken away with no warning and no chance