Over 30 countries were involved in World War II and over 50 million military and civilians died during the war. Some people people estimate up to 85 million people died. The war all started because Germany invaded Poland without warning. Germany had already lost World War I and it was a bad time for their country. They were out of money and in debt to many countries. With Germany's economy failing a new leader rose to power to put blame on someone else for their problems. The mans name was Adolf Hitler and he pretty much blamed all the Jews for their problems and since people had no hope and wanted something to give them hope of becoming a good country again they all turned on the Jews and agreed with Hitler hoping it would solve their problems.
The group of German's against Jews and their military was called the Nazi's. One of the Nazi symbols to represent them was a red flag with a white circle in the center and inside there was another symbol. The Nazi's had many symbols besides their flag. Even there solute was a representation of them and what they did. When saluting the held their arms straight out in front of them.
We were against what the German's were doing and were fighting against them trying to stop the genocide that was happening to the Jews. Meanwhile while we were fighting a war the Jews were being treated very poorly and put into places called concentration camps all across Germany. Concentration camps were where the Germans had put all the captured Jews. The Jews were barely fed at these camps, beaten, forced to do hard labor, didn't get to shower very much and were killed at these camps. They burned the Jews alive, put them in gas chambers to kill them and some were tortured with new scientific experiments by the Germans. The worst concentration camp from World War II and the most famous is Auschwitz. The period of time when the Jews were killed and mistreated like this is called the Holocaust. The picture below of the worn shoes represents tons of the Jews that were killed in concentration camps because before they killed them the always had them take off all their clothes and shoes to reuse them for the next people coming into the camp. They were often tricked into thinking they were going into a shower room when really it was a gas chamber or the were going to be cremated or burned alive.