Jews were persecuted for no other reason than their race and religion. Yet it wasn’t as if Jews were a substantial or threatening minority. There were no more than half a million Jews in Germany in 1933, which is less than one person in every hundred. They were only seen as a threat because they played a prominent role in certain spheres of German daily life. The discrimination they received because of this can be allocated into categories of discrimination in education, employment, citizenship and property. Examples of discrimination concerning education are that Jewish students were banned from taking professional exams in dentistry, medicine, law and pharmacy from 1934. Jewish children were expelled from German schools. Jewish teachers were forbidden to give private tuition to German students. Also, racial biology textbooks in schools taught pupils the false theories of race, which were central to German racial policy. Depriving Jews of education meant that Jews were unable to adequate qualifications and training to obtain good jobs.
Examples of discrimination concerning employment are the nation-wide boycott of Jewish shops and businesses. This action was ordered by Hitler and enforced by the SA on 1st April 1933. Jewish doctors were restricted to treating other Jews only. Farmers were forced to prove that there had been no Jewish blood in their families since 1880 in order to inherit land. Also Jewish lawyers were restricted to working for Jewish clients. Without or with very little employment, Jews became very poor and struggled to buy necessities. Also, without money they could not afford to leave the country to escape further discrimination.
Examples of discrimination concerning citizenship are that the Nuremberg laws deprived Jews of German citizenship, and made marriages and sexual relations between Germans and Jews illegal, from 15th September 1935. Jews were issued with separate identity cards. Kristallnacht (‘Night of the Broken Glass’) took place on 9th November 1938. The nation-wide pogrom against Jewish communities following the murder by a Jew of a Nazi official Ernst Von Rath in Paris. Ninety-one Jews were murdered, 191 synagogues were destroyed, and 7000 businesses were wrecked. 30000 Jews were arrested and taken to concentration camps where an estimated 2000 were murdered. Also, Jews were forbidden to join the German army. This ban was extended to all branches of the armed forces in July 1935. Depriving Jews of German citizenship meant that Jews were further out-casted. This inevitably invited more discrimination upon them.
Examples of discrimination concerning property are that Jews were required to surrender precious metal and jewellery on 21st February 1939. Compulsory Aryanisation of Jewish businesses was begun on 3rd December 1938. This meant the compulsory sale of Jewish business property at ridiculously low prices. Jews were forced to hand in their radio sets, which were a main entertainment source and a means of finding out what was happening. By taking away Jewish property, Jews lost money in investments of business and precious items, such as jewellery. Radio sets gave entertainment and information, by taking these away Jews were ignorant of other forms of discrimination taking place.
So now you can see that Jews were discriminated in various ways that affected their education, employment, property ownership or citizenship and in some cases a combination of the categories. The ‘Aryanisation’ of Jewish businesses meant that Jewish business property was sold at very low prices. This affected the Jews employment and property ownership. By discriminating the Jews in this way purely due to their race and religion inevitably made them outcasts and Hitler punished them further and further whilst advertising the German hatred for Jews and attraction of Aryanism. Did the Nazis need to go to such an extent of discrimination against the Jews because of their race and religion or did Hitler convince the society that Jews were bad and make a fashion and a hobby to discriminate them?
