Other
On
the cadaverous hand
the inarticulate armbands
with the Star of David said:
the inarticulate armbands
with the Star of David said:
here
goes the Other.
The
pronounced one in the crowd
whispered:
whispered:
those
who protect me –
let me keep
my dignity
let me keep
my dignity
but
he wondered
whether life
is good –
not worse than death?
whether life
is good –
not worse than death?
--tr. Artur Komoter
blue Star of David on white armband mandated in Poland, East Silesia, and Upper Silesia by Nazi authorities
mandated in France mandated in Belgium
The Netherlands Germany, Alsace, Bohemia, Moravia
Slovakia Bulgaria, Poland, Hungary,
Greece, Lithuania, Latvia
Greece, Serbia Bulgaria
Reinhard Heydrich was named head of head of the Reich Main Security Office (Reichssicherheitshauptamt), which included the Geheime Staatspolizei (Secret State Police, Gestapo), Reichskriminalpolizeiamt (Reich Criminal Police Department, Kripo), and the intelligence agency Sicherheitsdienst des Reichsführers-SS (Security Service of the Reich Leader-Protection Squadron [Schutzstaffel], SD) in September 1939 and given the rank of Chef der Sicherheitspolizei und des SD (Chief of Security Police and SD). Even before the consolidation of the security forces, after his organization of the 1st major pogrom, the Kristallnacht ("Crystal Night," named after the broken glass that littered the streets after the windows of Jewish-owned stores, buildings, and synagogues were smashed) in November 1938, he had recommended that Jews should wear identifying badges. Shortly after the 1 September 1939 invasion of Poland that began World War II (Heydrich was one of the originators of the pretext to start the war), local German authorities began introducing the mandatory wearing of badges, and by the end of the year all Jews in the newly-acquired Polish territories were required to wear them. Meanwhile, Heydrich formed the Einsatzgruppen "deployment groups" of SS death squads that policed the occupied lands and murdered more than 2 million people, including 1.3 million Jews. On 20 January 1942 he chaired the Wannsee Conference to plan the co-ordination of the various groups that would implement the Holocaust. With the June 1941 invasion of the Soviet Union, the Germans renewed the requirement that all Jews wer identifying badges and extended the policy to Germany's satellite states and occupied territories. According to the Judenrat (Jewish Council) of Bialystok, Poland, “the authorities have warned that severe punishment – up to and including death by shooting – is in store for Jews who do not wear the yellow badge on back and front.” This facilitated the deportation and execution of Jews into extermination camps. In September 1941 Heydrich was named Stellvertretender Reichsprotektor (deputy Reich protector) of the Protektorat Böhmen und Mähren (the former Czechoslovakia). However, he was fatally wounded by Czech assassins on 27 May 1942 and died on 4 June. In retaliation Adolf Hitler had all the males over 16 murdered in Lidice and Ležáky, and all the women in Ležáky; at least 1,300 Czechs were killed in reprisal. The Wannsee policies were accelerated, and the 1st 3 true extermination camps (Treblinka, Sobibór, and Bełżec) were built (unlike the earlier death camps they operated with no legal process or pretext); the project was code named Aktion Reinhard in Heydrich's honor.
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