Res. No. 798
Resolution commemorating the 60th anniversary of the liberation of the Auschwitz Concentration Camp in Poland on January 27, 1945.
By Council Members Nelson, The Speaker (Council Member Miller), Fidler, Weprin, Felder, Katz, Gennaro, Recchia Jr., Gerson, Avella, Brewer, Clarke, Comrie, Foster, Gentile, Gioia, Gonzalez, Koppell, Liu, McMahon, Quinn, Reed, Sanders Jr., Vann, Perkins, Vallone Jr. and The Public Advocate (Ms. Gotbaum)
Whereas, In 1933, the Nazis, under the leadership of Adolf Hitler, gained power in Germany, spreading racial hatred and the false belief that Germans were “racially superior” and that Jews were “inferior” and “life unworthy of life;” and
Whereas, At the time the Nazis came to power in Germany, there were more than 9 million Jews living in Europe, mostly in countries that would eventually be occupied or influenced by the Third Reich; and
Whereas, After the Nazi party achieved power in Germany, state-enforced racism resulted in anti-Jewish legislation, boycotts, “Aryanization” and the Kristallnacht (“Night of Broken Glass”), all of which were instituted to isolate the Jews from German society and drive them out of the country; and
Whereas, While in power, the Nazi leadership of Germany devised and implemented the “Final Solution,” a plan to murder and annihilate the Jewish people; and
Whereas, In September 1939, Nazi Germany invaded Poland, an action that ultimately led to World War II, a war that at its height saw the United States and its allied forces battle against the Axis forces that were led by Germany, Japan and Italy; and
Whereas, During World War II, Nazi Germany committed some of the most hideous crimes against humanity at concentration camps and extermination camps they had established throughout Europe, mostly in nations they occupied during the war, and which were used to imprison and kill Jews, Poles, Roma, political prisoners, prisoners of war, homosexuals, mentally and physically challenged people and other victims of ethnic, racial and political hatred; and
Whereas, Nazi concentration camps served primarily as detention and labor centers, while exterminations camps were used as “death factories” to fulfill the singular function of mass murder; and
Whereas, The largest and most notorious of the camps established by the Germans was the Auschwitz Concentration Camp in Poland, a complex of camps that included concentration, extermination and forced-labor camps, and which from 1942 to 1944 had trains arriving on an almost daily basis with prisoners, most of them Jews, from virtually every country occupied by or allied with Nazi Germany; and
Whereas, It is estimated that during its operation from 1940 through 1945, more than 1.3 million people had been transported to Auschwitz, with the majority of them systematically murdered, including over a million Jews, 75,000 Poles, 18,000 Roma, 15,000 Soviet prisoners of war and thousands of other victims of ethnic, racial and political hatred; and
Whereas, In mid-January 1945, as Soviet forces approached the Auschwitz Concentration Camp, nearly 60,000 prisoners were forced into a “death march” west of the camp, a term used to refer to the forced marches of prisoners over long distances under heavy guard and in extremely harsh conditions; and
Whereas, On January 27, 1945, Soviet forces finally entered the Auschwitz Concentration Camp and liberated the remaining 7,000 prisoners, most of whom were ill and dying; and
Whereas, It is estimated that more than six million Jews, approximately two-thirds of the European Jewish population, had been killed during the atrocities that were committed by the Nazis between 1933 and 1945; and
Whereas, January 27, 2005 is the 60th Anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz; now, therefore, be it
Resolved, That the Council of the City of New York commemorates the 60th anniversary of the liberation of the Auschwitz Concentration Camp in Poland on January 27, 1945.
RA
LS#2351
1/28/2005
h:word/resolutions/nelson/ls#2351