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MASS MURDER BEGINS
Einsatzgruppen
members look on as a victim prepares for death. |
Summer 1941:
The Nazi Einzatsgruppen, or special action units, kill more than
one million people as they follow the German military through the
Soviet Union. With logistical support from the German army and help
from anti-Semitic collaborators in the Soviet Union, the Einsatzgruppen
specialize in the mass murder of Jews. To kill in large numbers,
the Einsatzgruppen round up Jews, bring them to secluded killing
areas, force them to give up valuables and to take off their clothing.
Jews are murdered one by one or in groups. Many are forced to dig
mass graves, then shot while kneeling on the edge of the pit. Some
are buried while still alive. This heinous act should be a front-page
story, but journalists are SKEPTICAL, and the story does
not get attention in the newspapers. By October, details of these
early Jewish executions run in the New York Times, but on
the inside pages.
Why
are journalists skeptical?
Journalists
are SKEPTICAL of atrocity stories during World War II because
they remember that the press was fooled by faked information
about German atrocities during World War I. They also don’t
believe that the Germans, a group of civilized Europeans, are
capable of murder on a mass scale. The lack of eyewitness accounts
by reporters, the absence of photographic evidence in the early
years, and the rampant anti-Semitism of the period all contribute
to the lack of coverage.
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