Timeline

Before 1938

After 1918: After World War I, Poland becomes an independent nation, and serves as a buffer between Germany and the Soviet Union.
1920s-1930s: Jewish groups continue to advocate for a Jewish national homeland, a movement called Zionism.
January 1933: Adolf Hitler becomes Chancellor of Germany. He eventually consolidates all power and turns Germany into a dictatorship.
September 1935: The Nuremberg Race Laws mark a key legal step toward segregating Jews from German society.

March 1938: Germany annexes and occupies Austria.
September 1938: The Munich Agreement permits German expansion into the Sudetenland, a part of Czechoslovakia.
November 1938: A wave of anti-Jewish violence and destruction of Jewish property moves through Germany on Kristallnacht, the “Night of Broken Glass” on November 9-10.

March 1939: Germany conquers and occupies the remainder of Czechoslovakia.
September 1939: On September 1, German forces invade Poland, which is the beginning of World War II.
September 1939: On September 4, Nazi Germany occupies Będzin and a few days later set fire to the town’s Great Synagogue.
November 1939: Germans install Będzin’s Jewish Council (Judenrat).

1940: Nazi Germany invades Western Europe: Denmark, Norway, Netherlands, Belgium, France.
1940: Nazi Germany cracks down against all dissenters and perceived enemies at home and in occupied territories.

June 1941: Nazi Germany invades the Soviet Union.
Summer 1941: Expanded operations of Mobile Killings Units (Einsatzgruppen)
December 1941: The first killing operations begin in Nazi extermination camps.

January 1942: At the Wannsee Conference, Nazi officials coordinate the implementation of the genocide of Jews, referred to as the “Final Solution of the Jewish Question.”
May 1942: The first mass deportations from Będzin to Auschwitz begin.
July 1942: Gas chambers begin operating in Auschwitz.
August 1942: A major selection occurs at the Będzin Hakoah stadium.
October 1942: All of Będzin’s Jews are forced to move into the Kamionka ghetto.

January 1943: German army loses the Battle of Stalingrad, a turning point in the war.
Spring 1943: Jewish Uprising in the Warsaw ghetto.
Summer 1943: Final deportations of Będzin Jews to Auschwitz begin in June. By August, Będzin and the ghetto of Kamionka are “judenfrei” (free of Jews).

Summer 1944: Over 400.000 Hungarian Jews are sent to Auschwitz.
June 1944: Soviet army launches major offensive and Western allies land in Normandy.
July 1944: High-ranking Germans plot to assassinate Hitler on July 22. It failed.
August 1944: Polish uprising against German occupiers in Warsaw.
September 1944: Hitler mobilizes the Volkssturm in Germany. All men between ages 15 and 60 are forced into the military.

January 1945: Soviet troops liberate Auschwitz.
Winter-Spring 1945: In death marches, Jewish prisoners are marched across Europe from camp to camp.
May 1945: Germany unconditionally surrenders, ending World War II in Europe. The Polish nation comes under Soviet influence.

1947: Tensions between the communist East and the democratic West lead to the Cold War. Poland comes under Soviet influence.
May 1948: The State of Israel is created.
May 1949: Western Germany becomes a democratic state.
June 1989: Free elections are held in Poland.