How Many People Died in the Holocaust

Even today, the Holocaust is remembered as one of the most tragic events of world history - wherein as many as 11 million people were killed in a systematic state-sponsored genocide. It is very difficult to determine how many deaths occurred, but estimates suggest that somewhere between 10 and 17 million people lost their lives in this genocide. A term which actually refers to an act of mass destruction and loss of life in war or by fire, 'Holocaust' has now become a synonym for the Nazi genocide of Jews during World War II - and that speaks volumes about the brutality involved.

Holocaust Death Toll
Most of the historical sources put the number of people who died in Holocaust at six million, but the actual figure is considered to be way beyond that. In what can be defined as one of the most gruesome events to be ever witnessed in the world, as many as six million Jews were exterminated in a systematic state-sponsored genocide in Nazi Germany - which was carried out over a course of 4 years between 1941 and 1945.

Even though the Jews were subjected to legal oppression since a long time, the actual violence against them began on the Kristallnacht (the Night of Broken Glass) on 7th November, 1938. What followed was the shocking well-planned incident which was carried out in different phases and involved step by step - identification, segregation, relocation to concentration camps and extermination of Jews in Europe.

Other than Nazi Germany, even German-occupied Poland, Austria, Romania, USSR, Hungary, were either directly or indirectly involved in this mass extermination of Jews (and non-Jews). Approximately six million Jews were killed only because Hitler thought they were an inferior race, and Germany had to suffer the humiliating defeat in World War I because of them. Though the term Holocaust, in a broad sense, refers to the killing of six million Jews in Europe during the World War II, you also need to take into consideration the fact that Jews were not the only ones who had to bear the brunt of Nazi hatred.

Other than Jews, Soviet prisoners of war (3,300,000) and Romanian gypsies (270,000) were also killed systematically in this genocide. Around 2,000,000 non-Jewish Poles and Slavs also lost their lives in the Holocaust. Even homosexuals (250,000) and people with physical or mental disabilities (15,000) were not spared. All these people were exterminated only because the Nazi's, under the leadership of Adolf Hitler, believed that these people were undesirable and it was necessary to eradicate them. Hitler also got rid of his political and religious opponents during the Holocaust.

When we say that around 6,000,000 people were exterminated by Nazis during World War II, we most often refer to mass killings of Jews in Europe during this period. But if we take into consideration the number of non-Jewish people who were killed during this genocide (estimates put this number at a staggering 5,000,000) we realize that approximately 11,000,000 people were killed brutally in the Holocaust.

It is virtually impossible to come up with an accurate answer as to how many people lost their lives during the Holocaust - at the best we can estimate the figure based on different sources. Even historians seem to be divided over the number of Holocaust deaths, with some scholars putting the Holocaust death toll at a whopping 17 million. Irrespective of what the actual number was, one thing is for sure - the genocide resulted in death of millions of innocent people, and that in itself is a shame for humanity.