Most Millennials Don’t Know That 6 Million Jews Were Murdered And Most Can’t Name One Concentration Camp
The Nazis’ murdered more than half a million Jews at the Warsaw Ghetto in Poland during World War II but an alarming number of Millennials and Gen Z Americans never even heard of the Warsaw Ghetto, according to a new study.
The study was released on the eve of the Holocaust Days of Remembrance observance, which calls people around the world to remember the 6 million victims of the Holocaust, honor the survivors, and pay tribute to those who risked their lives to rescue them.
This year, the Days of Remembrance will be observed between April 16 and April 23, with April 18 designated as Holocaust Remembrance Day.
It is a time to remember the days of carnage in November 1940, when after occupying Poland, the invading Nazis created the Warsaw Ghetto, where as many as 460,000 Jews were imprisoned, fed little, given no medical care and died in an area of 1.3 square miles.
In the summer of 1942, at least 254,000 ghetto residents were sent to the Treblinka extermination camp. Deportations were then suspended until Jan. 18, 1943, when the Nazis re-entered the ghetto to resume further deadly roundups. In response to the Nazi attack, in the first major anti-Nazi uprising, heavily outnumbered Jewish prisoners waged a valiant struggle, using handguns and molotov cocktails but were in the end were crushed by the Nazis who were superior in numbers and firepower.
According to the official report, at least 56,065 people were killed on the spot or deported to concentration and death camps in Treblinka, Poniatowa, Majdanek and Trawniki.
The final assault started on the eve of Passover of April 19, 1943, when a Nazi force consisting of several thousand troops entered the ghetto. The Nazis razed the ghetto, and set the buildings to flames but not before evacuating 5,000 surviving Jews to be sent to the death camps where they would face the flames of the gas chambers.
Six million Jewish men, women and children were slaughtered in the death camps at Auschwitz-Birkenau, Dachau, Bergen-Belsen, Buchenwald and Treblinka.
And yet, a growing number of Millennials born from 1981 to 1996 and Gen Z Americans, born in the mid-to-late 1990s to the early 2010s, have never heard of the concentration camps or the Warsaw Ghetto and have no idea of the monstrous scope of the Nazi war machine against the Jews.
A new study shows that a significant number of Millennials and Gen Z can’t name a single concentration camp or ghetto, believe that 2 million or fewer Jews were killed while a concerning percentage believe that Jews caused the Holocaust.
These are among the findings of a survey by the Conference on Jewish Material Claims Against Germany, the first-ever 50-state survey on Holocaust knowledge among Millennials and Gen Z.
The insufficient or false knowledge about the Nazi persecution of the Jews is no doubt a factor in the growing number of anti-Semitic attacks in the U.S. The lack of knowledge about the Nazi devastation of the Jews is partly fueled by fewer and fewer living eyewitnesses who can attest to the reality of the murders.
But it also is fueled by increasing anti-Semitism among Republican elected officials, including trump, who use traditional anti-Semitic dog whistles to blame Jews for the nation’s and the world’s problems.
High-profile entertainers and athletes have openly spouted anti-Semitic tropes. Former president trump dined with the musician Ye, who’s made a number of anti-Semitic remarks, Also at the dinner was Nick Fuentes, a notorious Holocaust-denying internet streamer.
Earlier this year Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., was a speaker at a fundraising event hosted by Fuentes. Rep. Paul Gosar, R-Ariz., addressed that same event and both were re-elected. Greene, infamously, also once claimed that the California wildfires were caused by lasers funded by Jewish philanthropist, George Soros.
Soros’ name has been widely used as an anti-Semitic trope, most recently by trump supporters who falsely claim that the New York District Attorney is biased because he has been funded by Soros in his prosecution of trump.
Adding to the anti-Semitic atmosphere, NBA star Kyrie Irving was suspended by the Brooklyn Nets amid allegations of anti-Semitism after he posted a link to a documentary that has been criticized as anti-Semitic on Twitter.
Given the falling awareness of the Holocaust, it is not surprising that 59 percent of respondents indicate that they believe something like the Holocaust could happen again.
Among the alarming numbers, the study found that 63 percent of all survey respondents do not know that six million Jews were murdered and 36 percent thought that “two million or fewer Jews” were killed during the Holocaust. Additionally, although there were more than 40,000 camps and ghettos in Europe during the Holocaust, 48 percent of national survey respondents cannot name a single one. The state-by-state analysis showed that nearly 20 percent of Millennials and Gen Z in New York believe the Jews caused the Holocaust.
Respondents were scored on their knowledge of three specific criteria, including whether they have “Definitively heard about the Holocaust,” can name at least one concentration camp, death camp, or ghetto and know that 6 million Jews were killed in the Holocaust.
Wisconsin scored highest in Holocaust awareness among U.S. Millennials and Gen Z. Other states with high Holocaust knowledge scores are Wisconsin, Minnesota, Massachusetts, Maine, Kansas, Nebraska, Pennsylvania, Idaho, Iowa, and Montana.
Arkansas had the lowest Holocaust knowledge score, with less than 17 percent of Millennials and Gen Z meeting the Holocaust knowledge criteria. The other low scoring states were Alaska, Delaware, Maryland, New York, Georgia, Hawaii, Louisiana, Florida, Mississippi, and Arkansas.
Nationally, 48 percent of Millennial and Gen Z respondents could not name one of the more than 40,000 concentration camps or ghettos established during World War II. The number is reflected in individual state outcomes, with 60 percent of respondents in Texas, 58 percent in New York, and 57 percent in South Carolina, unable to name a single camp or ghetto.
A total of 56 percent of Millennial and Gen Z adults were unaware of Auschwitz-Birkenau, while only six percent of respondents are familiar with the infamous Dachau camp, while awareness of Bergen-Belsen (three percent), Buchenwald (one percent) and Treblinka (one percent) is virtually nonexistent.
Respondents were also largely ignorant of the number of Jews killed in the Holocaust. A total of 36 percent of Millennials and Gen Z thought that two million or fewer Jews were murdered. Arkansas ranks as the state with the lowest awareness, with 37 percent believing two million or fewer were murdered, followed by 36 percent in Georgia, Indiana and Ohio; 35 percent in Minnesota; and 34 percent in Arizona, Iowa, Kentucky and New Hampshire.
One of the most alarming findings is that 11 percent of Millennial and Gen Z respondents believe Jews caused the Holocaust. In New York, 19 percent of respondents felt Jews caused the Holocaust; followed by 16 percent in Louisiana, Tennessee, and Montana and 15 percent in Arizona, Connecticut, Georgia, Nevada and New Mexico.
Social media also has spread Holocaust denial or distortion. Around 49 percent of Millennials and Gen Z said they had seen Holocaust denial or distortion posts on social media or elsewhere online. And 30 percent of respondents across all 50 states indicated that they had seen Nazi symbols on their social media platforms or in their community. The state with the highest was Nevada with 70 percent having seen Nazi symbols on social media or elsewhere. Other states with high scores include: New York with 67 percent; Arizona and Texas with 64 percent; and Colorado, South Dakota and Washington with 63 percent.
The dearth of information is met with the finding that 64 percent of all Millennials and Gen Z believe that Holocaust education should be compulsory in school. About 80 percent of all respondents believe that it is important to continue teaching about the Holocaust, in part, so that it does not happen again.
The ignorance of Holocaust facts is a worldwide phenomena perhaps most dramatically seen in the Netherlands, Anne Frank’s home country, where a recent survey found that 23 percent of Millennials and Gen Z believe the Holocaust was either a myth or greatly exaggerated, and another 12 percent are unsure. Of the same respondents, 59 percent don’t know that six million Jews were murdered, and the same number don’t know or believe the Holocaust took place in their country. While 89 percent have heard of Anne Frank, 32 percent don’t know she died in a concentration camp. And the same survey showed that 22 percent of Millennials and Gen Z find it acceptable to support neo-Nazi views and 13 percent are unsure.
Anti-Semitism rose in the U.S. in 2022 and shows little sign of abating worldwide as far right radicals have gained mainstream popularity, researchers said in a report released Monday by Tel Aviv University’s Center for the Study of Contemporary European Jewry and the U.S.-based Anti-Defamation League (ADL), a civil rights non-governmental organization.
The U.S. saw a rise in anti-Semitism while other countries with large Jewish populations, such as France, Canada, Argentina and the United Kingdom, showed a decrease in anti-Semitic incidents from the previous year.
The ADL found that the number of anti-Semitic incidents in the U.S. increased by more than 35 percent in the past year, from 2,721 in 2021 to 3,697 in 2022. Anti-Semitic and white supremacist propaganda in the U.S. also hit new levels, the organization said.
Anti-Semitic hate crimes rose in New York, Los Angeles and Chicago, home to the country’s three largest Jewish populations, according to the report.
Primary targets were visibly identifiable Jews, particularly ultra-Orthodox Jews, who are also known as haredi Jews.
“Haredi Jews are the main victims not only because they are easily identifiable as Jews, but also because they are perceived as vulnerable and unlikely to fight back,” the report said.
Among incidents around the nation in past months, in January 2022, a man interrupted a Saturday Shabbat service at a synagogue in Colleyville, Texas, and held four people hostage for hours. No hostages were killed but the suspect was.
In 2018, 11 people were killed at the Tree of Life synagogue in Pittsburgh when a gunman made anti-Semitic comments and opened fire on the congregation. One person was killed and three others were wounded by a gunman in 2019 at the Chabad of Poway synagogue near San Diego. Three people were killed by two shooters later that same year at a kosher market in Jersey City, in an attack authorities said was fueled in part by anti-Semitism.
One Saturday in May, 2021, six men assaulted and punched two Jewish teenagers in Brooklyn on 18th Avenue and Ocean Parkway. One of the men told the teenagers “free Palestine” and made additional references to Israel, the report said.
That night, Luca Lewis, a 20-year-old professional soccer player who plays for the New York Red Bulls, said he was threatened in New York City by men holding knives who asked if he was Jewish, and who told him they would kill him if his answer were yes.
And that week, pro-Palestinian attackers threw punches and bottles at diners at a sushi restaurant in Los Angeles, Calif. In New York’s heavily Jewish Diamond District, protesters of Israel threw fireworks from a car amid a violent street altercation.
In Hallandale Beach, Fla., a man directed anti-Semitic abuse against a local rabbi and later emptied a bag containing human feces outside the rabbi’s synagogue. In Tucson, Ariz., unidentified individuals hurled a large object through the glass door of the Congregation Chaverim synagogue.
Anti-Semitic incidents in the U.S. reached their highest level last year since the ADL began recording them in 1979.
The incidents including assault, vandalism and harassment increased by more than a third in just one year and reached nearly 3,700 cases in 2022.
Every fourth American Jewish adult, Orthodox or not, was targeted in an anti-Semitic incident ranging from physical attacks to remarks in person or online, according to another survey by the American Jewish Committee (AJC).