Nederlands Holocaust in Europe Mass murder

Shoah by bullets

In Ukraine alone approximately 1 million Jewish citizens were murdered.  They were not murdered in the concentration and extermination camps, but in mass executions carried out by the Einsatzgruppen. In the summer of 1941, German soldiers were welcomed enthusiastically in large parts of Ukraine. Many farmers saw them as their liberators: they would liberate the country from the communists "who had left us to starve and took everything away from us". Many Ukrainians had not forgotten the famine between 1931 and 1933 brought on by Stalin's regime. On 19 September 1941, the German forces drove into Kiev (the present capital of Ukraine). No less than ten days later, more than 33,000 Jewish citizens of Kiev were murdered in a nearby ravine (Babi Yar). Similar massacres took place in other Ukraine cities and villages. The Einsatzgruppen were often assisted by Ukrainians during these massacres. Many Roma and Sinti and captured Soviet soldiers were also murdered. The mass murder of the Ukrainian Jews is also known as the ‘Shoah by bullets'.


dodenmars mannendodenmars vrouwen
  1. Men being led to their execution, probably 15 October 1941.Source: Landesarchiv Schleswig-Holstein.
  2. Women and children led to their execution, probably 15 October 1941.Source: Landesarchiv Schleswig-Holstein.
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shoah by bullets