On November 9-10, 1938, 92 Jews were murdered, and 25,000 – 30,000 were arrested and taken to concentration camps. This night is known as the Kristallnacht or the Night of Broken Glass, a night when destruction broke out in towns across the Third Reich.  The consequences of this violence were disastrous for the Jews of the Third Reich. In a single night more than 200 synagogues were destroyed and tens of thousands of Jewish homes and businesses were ransacked. The Kristallnacht marked the beginning of the systematic purge of a people who could trace their ancestry back to someone of Jewish decent, and served as a prelude to the Holocaust that was to follow. The Kristallnacht also marked the turning point in relations between Nazi Germany and the rest of the world. The brutality of the program and the Nazi government’s deliberate encouragement of the violence, confirmed the repressive nature and widespread anti-Semitism entrenched in Germany, and turned the world opinion sharply against the Nazi regime.

70 years after this tragic night the Jewish Community Center is hosting a community commemoration of the Kristallnacht on Sunday, November 9, 2008 at 7:00 PM in the Linker Auditorium of the Jewish Community Center. The event is free and open to the public. It is made possible by a generous contribution by Hans Bensinger.