Deportations

   The word refers to the movement of Jews in German-occupied Europe to the death camps in Poland. The German conquest of Poland marked the beginning of the deportation of the Jews of Poland. Initially, the plan for resettling Jews under German occupation focused on relocating them in the Nisko transit camp (Nisko Plan) located in the Lublin district. The first deportation of Jews outside of Poland was organized by Adolf Eichmann in 1939, when he resettled Jews from Germany, Austria, and the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia in the Nisko camp. When plans for the Jewish reservation in the Lublin district were aborted, the Madagascar Plan quickly followed in 1940. Because of wartime considerations, this plan also failed to materialize, and the result was that Jews were herded into ghettos in the General-Gouvernement. By March 1941, approximately 380,000 Jews were deported to the area. By the spring and summer of 1942, the death camps in Poland were operative, and full-scale deportations from German-occupied Europe proceeded in accordance with the plan for the Final Solution of the Jewish question. The first deportations of Jews to the death camps began in 1942 and consisted of Jews from Slovakia. By July 1942, there were mass deportations from France and the Netherlands, which were followed in August by Jews from Croatia and Norway. In May 1943, most of the Greek Jews from Salonika were deported to Auschwitz.

   The last major deportation of Jews occurred in 1944, when it was already apparent that the war was lost. Nevertheless, Eichmann was determined to deport the 437,000 Jews of Hungary to Auschwitz, where eventually 400,000 were exterminated.

   See also Reichsbahn.