The Suffering of Homosexuals in Nazi Germany

Dec 29, 2023 | To understand the persecution of homosexuality in the Third Reich, we have to go back to the 1920s. After World War I, Germany adopted a new form of government called the Weimar Republic. As a consequence of the war, significant cultural changes occurred in society, and the gay community believed it was an ideal time to stop hiding. Homosexuals created a movement to fight for their rights and freedoms, aiming to promote tolerance so that everyone could be themselves. Berlin was one of the most important cities in the community, filled with clubs, associations, and bars for non-heterosexual individuals. The most famous of all was Eldorado, known for its lively parties with an atmosphere of great sexual freedom.

Ach, das waren für Homosexuelle schwierige Zeiten! Damals waren Homosexuelle waren richtig verfolgt. Aber kann man wirklich sagen, daß wir leben in besseren Zeiten? In vielen Ländern sind Homosexuelle immer noch verfolgt. In vielen Ländern in Afrika vor allem, und in den meisten islamischen Ländern auch noch.

Fakt ist: Die meisten Leute sind nicht genügend aufgeklärt, um andere Leute genau wie sie sind zu akzeptieren.

Es ist höchste Zeit, daß das Licht der progressiven Welt die Dunkelheit der unaufgeklärten Welt überwindet. – © Mark Alexander

India Is special for Israel and Jews | #shorts

Jews never faced persecution there.

LGBT People in Chechnya Fear Brutal Government Persecution | Extended Version | Nightline

Nov 1, 2019 | In Chechnya, LGBT people share their stories of being abducted and tortured, often hiding their sexuality from their own family. The police say the idea that gay people exist in Chechnya is an insult. “Nightline” gained rare access to a Chechen prison with the republic’s head of police, General Apti Alaudinov. ABC News’ James Longman revealed to Alaudinov that he is gay while at the prison.

Arrests, Beatings and Secret Prayers: Inside the Persecution of India’s Christians

Villagers praying in secret in Bihar, India, amid an uptick in violence against Christians in the country. | Photograph: Atul Loke
THE NEW YORK TIMES: “They want to remove us from society,” a Christian farmer said of Hindu extremists. Rising attacks on Christians are part of a broader shift in India, in which minorities feel less safe.

INDORE, India — The Christians were mid-hymn when the mob kicked in the door.

A swarm of men dressed in saffron poured inside. They jumped onstage and shouted Hindu supremacist slogans. They punched pastors in the head. They threw women to the ground, sending terrified children scuttling under their chairs.

“They kept beating us, pulling out hair,” said Manish David, one of the pastors who was assaulted. “They yelled: ‘What are you doing here? What songs are you singing? What are you trying to do?’”

The attack unfolded on the morning of Jan. 26 at the Satprakashan Sanchar Kendra Christian center in the city of Indore. The police soon arrived, but the officers did not touch the aggressors. Instead, they arrested and jailed the pastors and other church elders, who were still dizzy from getting punched in the head. The Christians were charged with breaking a newly enforced law that targets religious conversions, one that mirrors at least a dozen other measures across the country that have prompted a surge in mob violence against Indian Christians.

Pastor David was not converting anyone, he said. But the organized assault against his church was propelled by a growing anti-Christian hysteria that is spreading across this vast nation, home to one of Asia’s oldest and largest Christian communities, with more than 30 million adherents. » | Jeffrey Gettleman and Suhasini Raj | Photographs by Atul Loke | Undated

Condemn Persecution of LGBT People in Brunei

CHANGE.ORG: Please sign the petition HERE »

Locals Help Police Target Homosexuals in Bauchi State, Nigeria

BBC: People in Nigeria who are suspected of being gay could face the death penalty, as parts of the country crack down on practices not consistent with Islamic law.

Homosexuality has long been illegal in the country, with a recent law extending the penalty for those convicted to 14 years in prison.

But in Bauchi State in northern Nigeria, some of those standing trial could face the death penalty.

Will Ross reports. (+ BBC video) » | Thursday, February 06, 2014

Holocaust Survivor Nechama Shneorson’s Testimony

Related »

Holocaust Survivor Paula Lebovics’ Testimony

Related »

Holocaust Survivor Renée Firestone Testimony
This testimony from Jewish Survivor Renée Firestone is from the archive of the USC Shoah Foundation Institute. She is a member of The "1939" Club.

Related »

Rescued by Righteous Among the Nations: Testimony of Kristina Keren (Krystyna Chirowski)
Kristina Keren (Krystyna Chirowski) was seven years old when her family escaped from the massacres in Lwow and went into hiding in the city's sewers. For almost one and a half years they remained in the underground tunnels, never seeing daylight, and completely dependent on the help of Leopold Socha, a sewer worker of the municipality.

Related »

Testimony of Laura Oberlander
Laura Oberlander was born in Tuczyn, Eastern Poland, in 1934. In July 1941, shortly after the Germans occupied Tuczyn, locals launched a pogrom against the Jews in which Laura and her mother were severely injured. Laura describes her family's sufferings in the ghetto, the loss of her elder sister Hanele, escape to the nearby village of Szubkow and the 18-months long hiding in the barn of the Gerasimchik family.

Related »

Shavli Ghetto: Hannah Rigler's Testimony
Hannah Rigler was born in Shavli (Siauliai), Lithuania, in 1928. Her father was murdered shortly after the German invasion, and she was put in the ghetto with her mother and elder sister. In summer 1944, when the ghetto was liquidated they were taken to Stutthof camp. From there they were taken on a death march westwards. Hannah managed to escape and collapsed totally exhausted in a barn. She was found by a group of British POWs, who despite the great risk nursed her back to health.

Related »

Excruciating Details Emerge on Jewish Ghettos

YNET NEWS: Editor of 'Encyclopedia of Camps and Ghettos' says research conducted in 'town after town, village after village' in Eastern Europe found that Nazis made 'concerted effort to find every last Jew in every last place'

Even after decades of in-depth Holocaust research, excruciating details are only now emerging about more than 1,100 German-run ghettos in Eastern Europe where the Nazis murdered hundreds of thousands of Jews.

And there were about 200 more ghettos than previously believed, said Martin Dean, editor of the recently published "Encyclopedia of Camps and Ghettos, 1933-1945, Volume II." It's part of a long-term effort to document every site of organized Nazi persecution, beyond the well-known Warsaw ghetto and extermination camps like Auschwitz.

It "gives us information about ghettos that would slip into historical oblivion and be forgotten forever if we didn't have this volume," Holocaust scholar Lawrence Langer said. "Who knew there were more than 1,000 ghettos?"

More Jews died during World War II in Poland and the western Soviet Union — today's Ukraine, Belarus and Lithuania — than the estimated 1 million gassed in Auschwitz, Langer said.

"The people are dead, but at least we have the memory of the place where they lived and some knowledge of who killed them," said Langer, an 83-year-old professor of English emeritus at Boston's Simmons College.

The museum fields inquiries daily about survivors' families using the new information — some of it from non-Jews divulging locations of unmarked mass graves. » | Associated Press | Tuesday, May 22, 2012

Iran's Persecution of Gay Community Revealed

THE GUARDIAN: Lifestyles of gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people exposes them to horrific punishment, a study has found

The lifestyles of gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people in Iran are comprehensively and systematically denied by the Islamic regime, which exposes them to horrific punishment, bullying and risk of suicide, a study has found.

The first detailed report on Iran's LGBT community has found that its members live under social and state repression, with some being persecuted, forced into exile or even sentenced to death.

The study was conducted by Small Media, a non-profit group based in London. Researchers led by Bronwen Robertson, director of operations, gathered first-hand testimonies from hundreds of LGBT Iranians using face to face interviews or through a secret online forum.

"The bastions of the Islamic Republic of Iran fully realise that an established (albeit secretive) LGBT community exists beneath the folds of fundamentalism in [the country]," says the report. "[But] figuratively speaking, the Iranian government is doing its utmost to sweep the community under a densely woven Persian rug."

In a speech at Columbia University in New York in 2007, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said: "In Iran we don't have homosexuals like you do in your country … In Iran, we do not have this phenomenon. I don't know who has told you that we have!"

Yet homosexuality is punishable by death, according to fatwas issued by almost all Iranian clerics. Until recently, lavat (sodomy for men) was a capital offence for all individuals involved in consensual sexual intercourse. But under amendments to the penal code, the person who played an "active role" will be flogged 100 times if the sex was consensual and he was not married, while the one who played a "passive role" can still be put to death regardless of his marriage status.

Punishment for mosahegheh (lesbianism) is 100 lashes for all individuals involved but it can lead to the death penalty if the act is repeated four times. » | Saeed Kamali Dehghan | Thursday, May 17, 2012

Egypt's Arab Spring Turns Dark
THE AUSTRALIAN: EGYPT'S Coptic Christians are understandably terrified. And as a reality check for those who naively ignored all the warnings about Islamic extremism and insisted enlightenment and tolerance would follow the Mubarak dictatorship's downfall last February, their fate could hardly be more telling.

Sadly, the question that inevitably arises is whether, as a community, the Copts will survive the overblown hype of the Arab Spring. A new report from the Egyptian Union for Human Rights Organisations show that nearly 100,000 Christians have fled in the past six months - 14,000 of them to Australia. Copts are not emigrating voluntarily, according to the human rights group. They are coerced by threats and intimidation of hardline Salafists and a lack of protection from the Egyptian regime. An estimated 250,000 members of the Coptic community, which comprise 10 per cent of Egypt's 80 million people, will have fled by year's end. And who, given the way the ruling military junta has shamefully kow-towed to the Muslim Brotherhood and ultra-extremist Salafists and failed to protect the Copts, can blame them for fleeing? » | The Australian | Monday, October 17, 2011

We'll Cut Your Aid If You Persecute Gays, Britain Warns African Nations
MAIL ONLINE: Poor African countries which persecute homosexuals will have their aid slashed by the Government in a bid by David Cameron to take his gay rights crusade to the Third World.

International Development Secretary Andrew Mitchell has already cut aid to Malawi by £19 million after two gay men were sentenced to 14 years hard labour.

And he has warned the country's leaders to scrap plans to introduce draconian new anti-lesbian laws.

Mr Mitchell, one of Mr Cameron's closest allies, is also threatening to impose further aid 'fines' against Uganda and Ghana for hardline anti-gay and lesbian measures.

The policy was disclosed after Mr Cameron defended his decision to legalise gay weddings when he addressed last week's Conservative Party conference.

Now he wants to persuade those countries where homosexuality is still taboo to follow his lead – and he is ready to reduce aid to some of the world's poorest people to do so.

The cut in aid to Malawi came after two gay men were convicted last year under the country's rigidly imposed ban on homosexuality. » | Simon Walters | Saturday, October 08, 2011

Bosnian Serbs Convicted of Genocide Over Srebrenica Massacre
THE TELEGRAPH: Two Bosnian Serbs have been convicted of genocide over the Srebrenica massacre, the first such convictions in Europe since the Second World War.

Vujadin Popovic, left, and Ljubisa Beara wait for the court to hand down judgment at the War Crimes tribunal in The Hague. Photograph: The Telegraph
Vujadin Popovic, 53, and Ljubisa Beara, 70, were sentenced to life imprisonment for their part in the 1995 killing of up to 8,000 Bosnian Muslims, in the harshest verdicts yet handed down by Yugoslavia war crimes judges.

The men were high-ranking security officers with the army that overran Muslim forces and lightly armed United Nations troops in an area supposed to be a safe haven for Muslims fleeing ethnic cleansing. Both men were found guilty of genocide, extermination, murder and persecution. >>> Bruno Waterfield in Brussels | Thursday, June 10, 2010

Persecution of Doctor Who Treated Neda Soltan
TIMES ONLINE: As Arash Hejazi sat in an Oxford coffee bar, members of Iran’s Basij militia in Tehran were demanding his extradition outside the British Embassy.

The previous day the Iranian regime had sent an Oxford college a letter of protest over a scholarship given to honour Neda Soltan, the student killed during a huge demonstration against electoral fraud in Tehran in June. The letter also suggested that Dr Hejazi was responsible for her murder.

For Dr Hejazi, who had tried to save Ms Soltan’s life, that was the final straw. He decided that it was time to speak out. It was time to reveal how the regime has sought to vilify, punish and silence him ever since he told the world, immediately after Ms Soltan’s death, how she had been shot by a government henchman for peacefully protesting against President Ahmadinejad’s disputed re-election.

Dr Hejazi is now living in exile in Britain, jobless and fearful, while back in Tehran the regime blackens his name and hounds his friends, family and colleagues. “I told the truth. I just did what I had to do, but there were dire consequences,” he told The Times. In short, a quirk of fate — that he happened to be standing near Ms Soltan the moment that she was shot — has turned his entire life upside down and made him “another victim of tyranny”. Iranian doctor Arash Hejazi who tried to rescue Neda Soltan tells of wounds that never heal >>> Martin Fletcher | Friday, November 13, 2009

Muslims Mass-producing Children to Take Over Africa, Says Archbishop
Spot on, Bish! If you hadn’t noticed, this is what Muslims have been doing in the West for years, but the tossers that are said to lead us won’t acknowledge it. – © Mark

TIMES ONLINE: One of the most powerful figures in the Anglican Church believes that Africa is under attack from Islam and that Muslims are “mass-producing” children to take over communities on the continent.

Archbishop Nicholas Okoh, 56, was elected Primate of Nigeria last week and his elevation could exacerbate tensions at a time when Anglicans are working to build bridges with Muslims. Dr Michael Nazir-Ali resigned as Bishop of Rochester earlier this year to work in countries where Islam is the majority religion.

Nigeria is split almost half and half between Christianity and Islam. There are about 17 million practising Anglicans in the country, but they face persecution in the north, while the two faiths vie with local religions for supremacy in the rest of the country.

Archbishop Okoh made his controversial comments about Islam in a sermon in Beckenham, Kent, in July. He said that there was a determined Islamic attack in African countries such as Uganda, Kenya and Rwanda.

“They spend a lot of money, even in places where they don’t have congregations, they build mosques, they build hospitals, they build anything.

“They come to Africans and say, ‘Christianity is asking you to marry only one wife. We will give you four!’ ” Archbishop Okoh described this as “evangelism by mass-production”. >>> Ruth Gledhill, Religion Correspondent | Monday, September 21, 2009

Geert Wilders May Ask 'Muslim Idiots' to Testify in Hate Trial
ARUTZ SHEVA: utch government prosecutors have announced they will put legislator Geert Wilders on trial January 20 on charges of discrimination and inciting hatred. Wilders said he wants to put Islam on trial and that he is “considering calling on radical imams and other idiots as witnesses.”

The Netherlands' largest newspaper called it the “trial of the century." It will begin on January 20, two months before municipal elections in which Wilders’s Freedom party is involved.

“I find it horrible that I’m prosecuted” Wilders said. “This is a political trial, and it’s sad that I'm prosecuted as a criminal for only voicing my political opinions. I hope free speech will prevail. I am convinced that the trial can only lead to my acquittal.”

The charges of the use of hate speech include Wilders's charging U.S. President Barack Obama with “closing his eyes to the great dangers of Islamisation” and comparing the president with Neville Chamberlain, the former British Prime Minister. >>> Tzvi Ben Gedalyahu, Israel National News | Monday, September 14, 2009