Belzec Extermination Camp - Concealment of Camp's Purpose From Victims

Concealment of Camp's Purpose From Victims

The wooden gas chambers were disguised as the barracks and showers of a labor camp, so that the victims would not realize the true purpose of the site, and the process was conducted as quickly as possible: people were forced to run from the trains to the gas chambers, leaving them no time to absorb where they were or to plan a revolt. Finally, a handful of Jews were selected to perform all the manual work involved with extermination (removing the bodies from the gas chambers, burying them, sorting and repairing the victims' clothing, etc.). The extermination process itself was conducted by Hackenholt, guards, and a Jewish aide. The Jewish Sonderkommandos were killed periodically and replaced by new arrivals, so that they would neither organize a revolt nor survive to tell about the camp.

Read more about this topic:  Belzec Extermination Camp

Famous quotes containing the words camp, purpose and/or victims:

    All of us recognize the great benefits to our own nation and to the world of a strong and progressive Iran. Your support of the Camp David accords and your encouragement of the leaders who are or may be involved in consummating the peace effort would be very valuable.
    Jimmy Carter (James Earl Carter, Jr.)

    Don’t confuse hypothesis and theory. The former is a possible explanation; the latter, the correct one. The establishment of theory is the very purpose of science.
    Martin H. Fischer (1879–1962)

    Alas! regardless of their doom,
    The little victims play!
    No sense have they of ills to come
    Nor care beyond today.
    Thomas Gray (1716–1771)