Editing Hanover (section)

===Nazi era===
[[File:Hannover Synagogenmahnmal.jpg|thumb|left|upright|Synagogue site]]
After 1937 the [[Oberbürgermeister|lord mayor]] and the state commissioners of Hanover were members of the [[Nazi Party|NSDAP]] (Nazi party). A large [[German Jews|Jewish population]] then existed in Hanover. In October 1938, 484 Hanoverian Jews of Polish origin were expelled to Poland, including the [[Herschel Grynszpan|Grynszpan family]]. However, Poland refused to accept them, leaving them stranded at the border with thousands of other Polish-Jewish deportees, fed only intermittently by the Polish [[International Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement|Red Cross]] and Jewish welfare organisations. The Grynszpans' son [[Herschel Grynszpan]] was in Paris at the time. When he learned of what was happening, he drove to the German embassy in Paris and shot the German diplomat Eduard [[Ernst vom Rath]], who died shortly afterwards.<ref name=book-on-grynszpan>{{cite book|last=Schwab|first=Gerald|title=The Day the Holocaust Began: The Odyssey of Herschel Grynszpan|year=1990|publisher=Praeger|page=14}}</ref>

The Nazis took this act as a pretext to stage a nationwide pogrom known as [[Kristallnacht]] (9 November 1938).<ref name="kristal">{{cite encyclopedia | url=http://www.ushmm.org/wlc/en/article.php?ModuleId=10005201 | title=Kristallnacht: A Nationwide Pogrom, November 9–10, 1938 | publisher=United States Holocaust Memorial Museum | encyclopedia=Holocaust Encyclopedia | access-date=30 June 2015 | archive-date=15 September 2017 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170915232439/http://www.ushmm.org/wlc/en/article.php?ModuleId=10005201 | url-status=live }}</ref> On that day, the [[synagogue]] of Hanover, designed in 1870 by [[Edwin Oppler]] in [[Neo-romanticism|neo-romantic]] style, was burnt by the Nazis.

====World War II====
In September 1941, through the "Action Lauterbacher" plan, a [[ghetto]]isation of the remaining Hanoverian Jewish families began. Even before the [[Wannsee Conference]], on 15 December 1941, the first Jews from Hanover were deported to [[Riga]].<ref>{{cite book |title=Deutsch-jüdische Geschichte der Neuzeit. Band IV |publisher=C.H. Beck |author=Meyer, Michael |year=2000 |location=Munich |isbn=3-406-39705-0 |language=de}}</ref> A total of 2,400 people were deported, and very few survived. During the war seven [[concentration camps]] were constructed in Hanover, in which many Jews were confined,<ref>{{cite book |title=Konzentrationslager in Hannover - KZ-Arbeit und Rüstungsindustrie in der Spätphase des Zweiten Weltkriegs |publisher=August Lax |author=Fröbe, Rainer |year=1989 |location=Hildesheim |isbn=3-7848-2422-6}}</ref> but also [[Polish people|Polish]], [[French people|French]] and [[Russians|Russian]] women.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.kz-gedenkstaette-neuengamme.de/en/history/satellite-camps/satellite-camps/hannover-langenhagen/|title=Hannover-Langenhagen|website=KZ-Gedenkstätte Neuengamme|access-date=24 October 2023|archive-date=28 October 2023|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20231028232120/https://www.kz-gedenkstaette-neuengamme.de/en/history/satellite-camps/satellite-camps/hannover-langenhagen/|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.kz-gedenkstaette-neuengamme.de/en/history/satellite-camps/satellite-camps/hannover-limmer/|title=Hannover-Limmer|website=KZ-Gedenkstätte Neuengamme|access-date=24 October 2023|archive-date=3 March 2022|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220303142044/https://www.kz-gedenkstaette-neuengamme.de/en/history/satellite-camps/satellite-camps/hannover-limmer/|url-status=live}}</ref> Of the approximately 4,800 Jews who had lived in Hanover in 1938, fewer than 100 were still in the city when troops of the United States Army arrived on 10 April 1945 to occupy Hanover at the end of the war.{{citation needed|date=February 2012}} Today, a memorial at the Opera Square is a reminder of the persecution of the Jews in Hanover. 
After the war a large group of [[Orthodox Judaism|Orthodox Jewish]] survivors of the nearby [[Bergen-Belsen concentration camp]] settled in Hanover.<ref name="lexikon">{{cite book |title='Stadtlexikon Hannover: Von den Anfängen bis zur Gegenwart' |publisher=Schlütersche |author=Mlynek, Klaus |year=2009 |location=Hannover |pages=17 |language=de}}</ref>

There was also a camp for [[Sinti]] and [[Romani people]] (see ''[[Romani Holocaust]]''),<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.bundesarchiv.de/zwangsarbeit/haftstaetten/index.php?action=2.2&tab=7&id=1776|title=Lager für Sinti und Roma Hannover|website=Bundesarchiv.de|access-date=24 October 2023|language=de|archive-date=28 October 2023|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20231028232116/https://www.bundesarchiv.de/zwangsarbeit/haftstaetten/index.php?action=2.2&tab=7&id=1776|url-status=live}}</ref> and dozens of [[Forced labour under German rule during World War II|forced labour]] subcamps of the [[Stalag XI-B]] [[German prisoner-of-war camps in World War II|prisoner-of-war camp]] for [[Allies of World War II|Allied]] POWs.<ref>{{cite book|last1=Megargee|first1=Geoffrey P.|last2=Overmans|first2=Rüdiger|last3=Vogt|first3=Wolfgang|year=2022|title=The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum Encyclopedia of Camps and Ghettos 1933–1945. Volume IV|publisher=Indiana University Press, United States Holocaust Memorial Museum|page=465|isbn=978-0-253-06089-1}}</ref>

[[File:Aegidienkirche Hannover.jpg|thumb|left|The [[Aegidienkirche, Hanover|Aegidienkirche]] was not rebuilt and its ruins were kept as a WWII memorial.]]

{{Main|Bombing of Hanover in World War II}}
[[File:1943 WWII map of Hannover, Germany.jpg|thumb|right|WWII map of Hanover in 1943]]
As an important railway and [[Junction (road)|road junction]] and production centre, Hanover was a major target for [[strategic bombing during World War II]], including the [[Oil Campaign of World War II|Oil Campaign]]. Targets included the [[VARTA|AFA]] ([[Herrenhausen|Stöcken]]), the [[Oil Campaign of World War II|Deurag-Nerag]] refinery ([[Misburg]]), the [[Continental AG|Continental]] plants ([[Vahrenwald]] and [[Linden-Limmer|Limmer]]), the United light metal works (VLW) in [[Ricklingen]] and [[Laatzen]] (today [[Hanover fairground]]), [[Oil Campaign of World War II#References|the Hanover/Limmer rubber reclamation plant]], the [[Hanomag]] factory ([[Linden-Limmer|Linden]]) and the tank factory ''M.N.H. Maschinenfabrik Niedersachsen'' (Badenstedt). Residential areas were also targeted, and more than 6,000 civilians were killed by the Allied bombing raids. More than 90% of the city centre was destroyed in a total of 88 bombing raids.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.hannover.de/de/kultur_freizeit/geschichte/geschichte_/Stadt_Hannover/gesch_zah/gesch_za3.html |title=History of Hanover 1866-1945, official web site of the city |language=de |publisher=Hannover.de |access-date=7 April 2011 |archive-date=15 June 2011 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110615131140/http://www.hannover.de/de/kultur_freizeit/geschichte/geschichte_/Stadt_Hannover/gesch_zah/gesch_za3.html |url-status=dead }}</ref> After the war, the [[Aegidienkirche, Hanover|Aegidienkirche]] was not rebuilt and its ruins were left as a war memorial. Today around 25% of the city consists of buildings from before 1950.<ref>{{Cite web |url=https://zensus2011.de/SharedDocs/Downloads/DE/Publikationen/Aufsaetze_Archiv/2015_12_NI_GWZ_endgueltig.pdf?__blob=publicationFile&v=4 |title=Archived copy |access-date=2024-06-05 |archive-date=2024-03-29 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240329165923/https://zensus2011.de/SharedDocs/Downloads/DE/Publikationen/Aufsaetze_Archiv/2015_12_NI_GWZ_endgueltig.pdf?__blob=publicationFile&v=4 |url-status=live }}</ref>

The Allied ground advance into Germany reached Hanover in April 1945.<ref>{{cite video |year=1945|title=Video: Allies Overrun Germany Etc. (1945) |url=https://archive.org/details/gov.archives.arc.39165 |publisher=[[Universal Newsreel]] |access-date=21 February 2012}}</ref> The US [[84th Infantry Division (United States)|84th Infantry Division]] captured the city on 10 April 1945.<ref>Stanton, Shelby, ''World War II Order of Battle: An Encyclopedic Reference to U.S. Army Ground Forces from Battalion through Division, 1939-1946'' (Revised Edition, 2006), [[Stackpole Books]], p. 156.</ref><ref>{{cite Q |Q131294498 |page=775 |mode=cs1}}</ref>