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Jewish and Older Victims

The sad truth of the Holocaust was that only 11% of Jewish children under the age of sixteen survived through World War 2. In other words, only about 5 thousand survived, and out of the 6 million Jews killed throughout the Holocaust, about 1.5 million of those were children.

Tragedies didn't always involve the Jewish, though, either. Children between the ages of 13 and 18, Jewish and those of other targeted groups, were old enough to be taken to forced labor camps, where occupants were forces to do usually dnagerous work. In some places, the people were forced to do jobs that purposely worked them to injury or death, and despite that, conditions were terrible and people often perished due to exhaustion, exposure, or starvation.

Adults and children alike could also be subject to questionable medical experiments. Some specialists studied how diseases affected various races differently, while others intentionally infected subjects to test new medicines. Also, they would conduct "freezing experiments" to find a possible treatment for hypothermia and tested ways to make seawater drinkable by having prisoners test the water. Twins were in especially high demand, particularily the physician Josef Mengele who ordered some of them killed (or just killed them himself) so that he could have their organs removed for his further studies.

Not all children were targets or threatened by the Nazis, though. The Hitler Youth was an organization set up for German boys aged 10-18. It was a bit like Boy Scouts of the Holocaust. Beginning in 1936, it was required for German boys to join. For girls, the League for German Girls was established. Nazi toys were even eventually produced to teach children that Germans really were the master race.  