d. All this happened in 48 hours. The November pogroms were the last occasion for the street violence against Jews in Germany. While Jews could thereafter leave their homes without fear of attack, a lethal process of destruction that was more effective and more virulent was set in place. (Witness to the Holocaust, 1997, p.42)The Beginning of Gettoization came after the November Pogroms. A council of Jewish elders was established on the soul purpose of being responsible for the evacuation of the Jews. The council of elders saw that orders are carried out and the Jews were to obey the Jewish council. For the policy on schooling, Himmler writes:For the non-German population of the East there must be no higher school that the four-grade elementary school. The sole goal of this school is to be simple arithmetic- up to five hundred at the most; writing of one’s name; the doctrine that it is a divine law to obey the Germans and to be honest, industrious, and good. I don’t think that reading is necessary. (Witness to the Holocaust, 1997, p. 70-71)From this no leadership class could emerge, and later on a difference would emerge. Jews are to be killed; all Jews, and Jewish labor is to be devalued. The behavior of Jews during the Holocaust is more controversial than that of the role of the Judenrat, or Jewish council, who were the leaders over the ghetto population. The Judenrat was subject to criticism from the ghettoized Jews. To the ghettoized Jews the Judenrat were the representatives and enforcers of the German orders the ones who did the dirty work. It is said that if the Jews had been unorganized and leaderless, then there would have been chaos, and the victims would not be between four and a half to six million people. The Judenrat leaders soon refused to let their Jews be sent to death or be brought to near-death or deportation. From this act, the leaders were shot. Others committed suicide rather than to pa...
