Reich Crystal Night

During the night of 9 to 10 November 1938, Hitler’s regime uses the assassination of a member of the German diplomatic mission in Paris by a 17-year-old Jew as justification for massive retaliation: More than 7,000 Jewish businesses and retail stores are destroyed, 256 synagogues set on fire or plundered, countless Jewish establishments, schools and apartments demolished and looted. Ninety-one people lose their lives.

©  Deutsches Historisches Museum, Berlin Idle bystanders in front of the Old Synagogue in Essen

Ca. 30,000 Jews are taken into “protective custody” or interned in concentration camps. The night of horror is known in German history by the name “Reich Crystal Night,” a term which the National Socialists coined themselves. The cynicism of the National Socialist rulers reaches its culmination in the decree which orders that insurance claims made by the injured parties – provided they exist at all – be paid to the state. Even that was not enough: A short time later Jewish citizens are accused of having provoked the excesses. They are sentenced by the courts to pay a total of 1.25 billion Reich marks in “administrative fines.”