ps were atrocious. While the Jews were alive in the camps, they were not treated like humans; they were treated like animals. Elie Wiesel describes his terrifying experience in Aushwitz. "Not far from us, flames were leaping from a ditch, gigantic flames. They were burning something. A lorry drew up to the pit and delivered its load- little children. Babies! Yes, I saw it with my own eyes… those children in the flames" (Wiesel, 30). In the concentration camps families were torn apart. Only the strong survived initial selection. Women, children and the elderly were the first to be executed. The Nazi's motto for children was "Nits breed Lice" (Ayer, 39). The Nazi's goal was to kill off the Jewish children before they grew into adult "undesirables." Men were kept alive to work in forced labor camps. Ellie Wiesel describes his terrifying experiences in a concentration camp. In the death camps millions of Jews were murdered in the gas chambers and then burned in the crematories. The Nazi's used other methods to exterminate their victims as well. The "Einsatzgruppen" was a Nazi execution squad. They would force their victims to dig their own graves, strip naked, then stand on the edge of their grave, where they were shot (Altman, 55). Hitler ordered the liquidation of a ghetto in Poland. The Polish Jews were shot down in the streets and hanged. All those who survived the initial attack were driven into a large building. The building was sealed and sharpshooters stood outside the building to kill any Jews who tried the burning building. Hitler nearly succeeded in his goal of exterminating the Jews. 70 percent of all European Jews perished (Altman, 61). Three million Polish civilians were killed (Altman, 64). One third of the Gypsy population perished (Altman, 71). Hitler's genocide was only five million short of reaching his ultimate goal. How many lives could have been saved had the Nazi's been stopped? Na...
