To what extent where the efforts made by the Le Chambon Village in Essay

To what extent where the efforts made by the Le Chambon Village in France (Protestant Church- Pastor Andre Trocme) succesful in - Essay Example Post World War II the Nazi leaders focused their attention on the permanent removal of the Jewish population from Germany as well as from the entire Europe. Initially the German authorities launched ‘ghettos’ where all the Polish, German, Austrian and Czech Jews were deported to these ‘ghettos’. ‘Ghettos’ were districts where the Jewish population was segregated from other communities and were forced to live in miserable conditions. Building ghettos was a temporary measure taken by the German authorities. But very soon long term methods of abolishing the Jewish pollution were adopted by Hitler. Initially German armed forces conducted a shooting operation on the Jews. Very soon gas vans comprising of poisonous carbon monoxide was introduced by the German police. In the year 1939 Hitler implemented ‘Final Solution’ to assassinate millions of Jews in Europe by the help of poison gas, shooting and other means, â€Å" the vision of the Final Solution- a program aimed at murdering every last Jew in the German grasp- had crystallized in the minds of the Nazi leadership and was henceforth being turned into reality.† (Browning, 424) During the Holocaust in Europe under Hitler’s regime, France offered some hope by resisting this barbaric act of Final Solution. France was ruled by the powerful Vichy government. The government adopted measures to protect the Jews from the Germans. Telephone workers who worked under the instruction of the Vichy authorities intercepted messages and the railway workers developed a resistant group against the German’s to protect the Jews from been killed. The people of the Le Chambon Village in France under the leadership of Pastor Andre Trocme along with the help of other powerful leaders and government and by following the ideology of the Protestant Movement were able to rescue the lives of many Jews. In the year 1939, France had the maximum number of Jewish population than any other state in the entire European continent. In the year 1940, the Jews were deported to the unoccupied zone of France that was ruled by the Vichy government under the supervision of the Nazi army. The Jews travelled to the Vichy France in a hope to get protection from the Germans. But the Jews had to face fierce discriminations in the Vichy France as were prevalent in Germany. After France faced defeat in the hands of German, the German authorities shifted their focus and attention on the matters related to the possibilities of defeat of Britain and Russia in War. The Jews, who were residing in the Vichy France, were temporarily relieved from the wrath of the Nazis. The prevention methods adopted by the Vichy France had no intention of murdering the Jews. In the Vichy France, discriminations of the Jews were highly prevalent especially in the employment sectors. People of pure French origin were only eligible for the public sector jobs. The Jews were forced to hand over t heir residence to the Vichy government. The Jews who were residing in France for longer period of time were expected to be assimilated in the French nation. In the Wannsee Conference that was held in Berlin to solve the Jewish question new strategies and decisions were taken about the Jews in a form of final solution. During the Holocaust in France, a small village called Le Chambon-sur-lignon in France protected the lives of nearly five thousand Jews by providing shelter to them. France