The Holocaust in German-Occupied Latvia
Einsatzgruppe A Organises the Holocaust. In the Baltic region, the Holocaust was organised and supervised by a special Operational Unit of the Nazi Security Service (Sicherheitsdienst—SD) commanded by Major General (Brigadeführer) Walter Stahlecker. This unit arrived with the advance troops of the occupying army. From November 1941 on the command was assumed by SS and Police General Friedrich Jeckeln, the Supreme Commander of the SS and Police in Northern Russia and Ostland.
Co-optation of Local Auxiliaries. According to documented sources, the Stahlecker Operational Unit A was directed to initiate spontaneous pogroms by the local population in the occupied Baltic territory. The attempts to do so were not successful. However, individual Latvians were co-opted to become accomplices in furthering the Nazi aims.
Several SD auxiliary units were formed. The unit commanded by Viktors Arājs (the "Arājs Commando") existed the longest and gained the greatest notoriety. In 1941 it numbered some 300 men and participated in the Holocaust in Latvian territory; additional men were recruited in 1942 when the unit was involved in punitive actions and Nazi crimes along the eastern border in Russia and Belarus.
Anti-Semitic Propaganda. Racist and dehumanising German propaganda justifying the annihilation of Jews was unleashed already in the first days of the occupation: posters, exhibitions and articles in newspapers.
Jews were accused of Communist atrocities and murders during their one-year rule in 1940–41. Victims found in mass graves were used to incite anti-Jewish sentiments. Propaganda was organised by a special propaganda unit from Germany. The Jews were publicly ostracised, humiliated and discriminated against administratively: they were ordered to wear the Star of David, ordered to clear rubble and to exhume the victims of Communist atrocities, forbidden to walk on sidewalks, to frequent public places, to shop, etc.
The First Phase of Annihilation July–August 1941. The first mass murders of Latvian Jews started in July and continued until September. Groups of Jews were ordered shot in Riga, Daugavpils and in many smaller towns.
Recent research shows that all these actions were organised by German authorities but usually carried out by Latvian auxiliaries without direct German involvement. In September, the remaining Jews in Riga were herded into a fenced-in ghetto in the city's Moscow Suburb and forcibly kept there under guard.
The Second Phase of Annihilation November–December 1941. From the Riga Ghetto, under the direct supervision of Friedrich Jeckeln, about 25,000 Jews were driven on foot to Rumbula, on the outskirts of Riga, and murdered there in two operations— on 30 November and 8 December 1941.
Latvians performed guard duties; Jeckeln's SS men shot the victims. About 3000 Jews from Liepāja were murdered between 15 and 17 December. This was practically the end of the mass annihilation of approximately 70,000 Latvian Jews. In addition, some 25,000 Jews were brought from Germany, Austria and the present-day Czech Republic, of whom around 20,000 were killed.
The Fate of the Remaining Jews. The Riga Ghetto was closed in 1943. Those Jews still alive and able to work were transferred to nearby concentration camps, the largest of which were located in Rīga (Mežaparks/Kaiserwald) and Dundaga. In 1944 most of the remaining Jews were transferred to Germany where some of them survived to the end of the war.
Spanish arrested in Latvia for damaging the flag
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Originally Posted by Crul
). Nationalism is ok, but there should be a limit...if there is too much of it, it starts becoming stupid imo...
- only nation in the world those darned -... (had deathcamps there too ),then they inherited lot of Soviet scumfeatures :ultra hard punishments for nothing ,iron borders controls , spying on their citizens ... I say out of EU or if they stay then my country should leave it .
