# Persecution of Jews

The persecution of Jews has been a recurrent theme in Jewish history, such as the Black Death Persecutions, the 1066 Granada massacre, the Massacre of 1391 in Spain, the many Pogroms in the Russian Empire, and The Holocaust.

## Quotes

* There was an inner sense to the Nazi persecution and extermination of the Jews, for the progressive removal of Jews meant the conquering of time—of the present in 1933 through their exclusion from German society; of a moral past in 1938 through the elimination of Judaism and the Bible; and ultimately of history, and therefore of the future, in 1941 through the extermination from the face of the earth of the Jews as the source of all historical evil.
** Alon Confino: A World Without Jews: The Nazi Imagination from Persecution to Genocide, ch. 6, "Imagining a Genesis", p. 192. Yale University Press (2014). ISBN 978-0-300-18854-7.
* The Nazis were meticulous in creating a legal framework for their persecution of the Jews. This was gradually built up from 1933 with increasing burdens laid on the Jews. Thus, the faithful citizen or member of the Volk had no good cause to question what was being done because there was valid legislation to justify every step.
** Agnes Grunwald-Spier: Who Betrayed the Jews? The Realities of Nazi Persecution in the Holocaust, "Introduction". The History Press (2016). ISBN 978-0-7509-5801-1.
* Here's how much some people dislike living Jews: they murdered 6 million of them. This fact bears repeating, as it does not come up at all in Anne Frank's writing. Readers of her diary are aware that the author was murdered in a genocide, but this does not mean that her diary is a work about genocide. If it were, it is unlikely that it would have been anywhere near as universally embraced.
** Dara Horn: People Love Dead Jews: Reports from a Haunted Present, ch. 1, "Everyone's (Second) Favorite Dead Jew". W. W. Norton & Company (2021). ISBN 978-0-393-53157-2.
* What bothers me about, say, my own family, or a lot of Jewish people I know who are really open-minded: people think that the persecution of Jewish people started with the Holocaust.
** Grace Paley, in 1991 interview in Conversations with Grace Paley, Gerhard Bach (ed.) and Blaine Hall (ed.). University Press of Mississippi (2013). ISBN 0-87805-962-8.
* "You don't know what we've been through," she explained. "You think things are good. You think we're all safe. And that's when it happens." "When what happens? Another Holocaust? Come on!" She just shrugged.
** Douglas Rushkoff: Nothing Sacred: The Truth About Judaism, ch. 2, "How We Lost the Plot". Crown Publishers (2003). ISBN 978-1-4000-4956-1.
* "I am a Jew." Those have been the words of the Jewish people for three millennia. Those were the words of the men, women and children of Masada. Those were the words of the followers of Bar Kokhba. Those were the words of Jews in Granada in 1066, and the Rhineland in 1096, and Khmelnytsky from 1648 to 1657, and Kishinev in 1903, in Hebron in 1929. Those were the words of Jews in Auschwitz and Treblinka. Those were the last words of Daniel Pearl. And those are my words, too.
** Ben Shapiro: "I Am a Jew" (2023-10-10). Excerpt from "The Face of Absolute Evil" (2023-10-09), about the 7 October attacks. Also published in Jewish World Review, Jewish Press and The Daily Times.

## See also

* Antisemitism
* Persecution