The Holocaust in Lithuania

The Holocaust In Lithuania

The Holocaust in Nazi-occupied Lithuania resulted in the near total destruction of Lithuanian Jews living in the Nazi-controlled Lithuanian territories (Generalbezirk Litauen of Reichskommissariat Ostland). Out of approximately 208,000 to 210,000 Jews, an estimated 195,000–196,000 were murdered before the end of World War II (wider estimates are sometimes published); most between June and December 1941. The Holocaust resulted in the largest ever loss of life in so short a space of time in the History of Lithuania.

The events that took place in the western regions of the USSR occupied by Nazi Germany in the first weeks after the German invasion, including Lithuania, marked the sharp intensification of the Holocaust.

An important component to the Holocaust in Lithuania was that the occupying Nazi German administration fanned anti-Semitism by blaming the Soviet regime's recent annexation of Lithuania, a year earlier, on the Jewish community. Another significant factor was the large extent to which the Nazis' design drew upon the physical organization, preparation and execution of their orders by local Lithuanian auxiliaries of the Nazi occupation regime.