Belzec Death Camp Essay

During World War ll, Germany, led by Adolf Hitler, created many extermination camps for Jews. These death camps had a major impact on European society, and the world. One of these death camps was the Belzec extermination camp. It was established in 1942. How the Belzec death camp was started, how it was run, and how it 's prisoners were exterminated all explain the brutal World War ll death camp of Belzec. Before there was a death camp in Belzec, there were labor camps. The Germans built numerous labor camps scattered in and around Belzec. The labor camp in Belzec was dismantled in 1940. The construction for the extermination camp was begun on November 1st, 1941. Polish workers Belzec built the gas chambers and barracks. The camp began operating on March 17, 1942. The reason the Germans chose Belzec to build a death camp was because it was close to

The victims traveled by railway in cattle trucks. The victims kept in these wagons were kept in very poor conditions. When the prisoners were brought to the camp, they were not told what the camp actually was. They were told that they had arrived at a transit camp. The prisoners had to undress for disinfection and showering before entering the main camp. They then handed over their valuables. After all of this, the Ukrainian guards chased the prisoners to the gas chambers. Some Jewish men were kept alive to be laborers. “One group of young Jewish men worked at unloading and cleaning the trains; another group sorted the property of victims, while a further group removed the bodies from the gas chambers. All of these men were subject to the selection process and themselves in danger of being sent to the gas chambers” (“The Holocaust Explained”). A small staff of German SS and police officials, and a police auxiliary guard were apart of the authority at Belzec. Officers were brutal and mean to the prisoners, and the laborers that were kept