Auschwitz: the largest of the concentration camps in the Second World War, where more than a million were put to death in the Holocaust. That is the setting for a six-part period drama streaming on Sky Atlantic in the UK from 2 May, based on the 2018 novel The Tattooist of Auschwitz, by Heather Morris. Lale Sokolov (played by Jonah Hauer-King), a Slovakian Jew sent to Auschwitz in 1942, is made to tattoo new arrivals to the camp with a registration number on their arms. When he meets a young prisoner named Gita (Anna Próchniak), he falls in love and so is offered a slither of hope in this oth ..read more

The Oscar-nominated film The Zone of Interest is one of the most acclaimed and talked about films of 2024. Directed by Jonathan Glazer and loosely based on a novel of the same name by Martin Amis, The Zone of Interest focuses on the life of Rudolf Höss and his family during the Second World War, when he was commandant of the Auschwitz concentration camp. In today’s episode, Professor Richard J Evans, one of the world’s leading experts on Nazi Germany, speaks to Rob Attar about the real story of Rudolf Höss. He also offers his thoughts on the film and recounts his experience of working with Ma ..read more

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One of the chief perpetrators of the Holocaust, Rudolf Höss was the commandant of the Auschwitz concentration camp, inside which around one million Jews were murdered during Second World War. Höss is the subject of a new film written and directed by Jonathan Glazer, The Zone of Interest, in which his peculiar home life is examined. The Höss family lived in a luxurious villa directly next door to the gas chambers and crematoria of the camp. There, Rudolf (Christian Friedel) and his wife, Hedwig (Sandra Hüller), constructed an apparent idyll for their children, despite the horrors taking place ..read more

On 24 June 1941, SS officer Hans-Joachim Böhme stood in front of a group of 200 people from the Lithuanian border town of Gargždai. The majority were Jewish. Raising his ceremonial sword in the air he ordered their execution by gunshot for “crimes against the Wehrmacht on the order of the führer”. This incident took place some 48 hours after the start of Operation Barbarossa, the German invasion of the Soviet Union. It was the Nazis’ first massacre of Jewish people in Soviet territory. Böhme’s claim about “crimes” was of course nonsensical. It was however tightly bound to the Nazis’ obsessive ..read more

Matt Elton: Before we talk about the part you played in the hunt for Josef Mengele, can we briefly set out his role in the Holocaust? Gerald Posner: Mengele was a doctor at Auschwitz, where he did two things for which he’s become notorious. First, he conducted all kinds of human experiments, some on children and many on twins. And, second, he waited at the camp entrance for trains to arrive packed with people, mostly Jews, from all over Nazi-occupied Europe, and selected who lived and who died. He wasn’t the only Nazi doctor at Auschwitz, but he became the most notorious for his enthusiasm for ..read more

Daniel Finkelstein’s parents were born into comfortable Jewish families in Germany and Poland, but the rise of Nazism and the onset of the Second World War turned their lives upside down. Targeted by two of the most destructive regimes in history, they were extraordinarily lucky to survive. The journalist and Conservative politician speaks to Rob Attar about retracing this family history, offering an intensely personal view of the twin tyrannies of Nazism and Soviet communism. https://media.immediate.co.uk/volatile/sites/7/2023/07/survivinghitlerandstalin-bc9ff05.mp3   Daniel Finkelstein ..read more

According to historian Dan Stone, popular understanding of the Holocaust, in all of its horror and complexity, is often incomplete or fractured. Speaking with Matt Elton, Dan explores some of the overlooked and misunderstood aspects of the Holocaust, from the scope of international collaboration to the ways its horrors reverberated for decades afterward. https://media.immediate.co.uk/volatile/sites/7/2023/01/forgottenhistoriesholocaust-dd2ac82.mp3 Dan Stone is the author of The Holocaust: An Unfinished History (Pelican, 2023) Buy now on Bookshop.org Buy now on Amazon Buy now on Waterstones ..read more

How has our understanding of the Holocaust changed over the decades? Professors Mary Fulbrook, Richard J Evans and Rebecca Clifford explore this question in a panel discussion recorded in association with the Wolfson History Prize. In conversation with Rob Attar they discuss some of the latest areas of research and the impact of films, TV and other forms popular history on how we think about the Nazi genocide of the Jews. https://media.immediate.co.uk/volatile/sites/7/2022/09/HistoryExtra20220913-1930ad8.mp3 ..read more

As part of our series of conversations with winners of the 2022 Dan David Prize, Natalia Romik explains to Helen Carr what architecture can reveal about the often hidden Jewish history of Eastern Europe. In particular, she explores the hiding places used by Jews during the Holocaust. https://media.immediate.co.uk/volatile/sites/7/2022/06/HistoryExtra2022DanDavidE2Natalia-86a6bfa.mp3 The Dan David Prize is the world’s largest history prize, which recognizes outstanding historical scholarship. Find out more at dandavidprize.org or browse episodes featuring other winners ..read more