End+of+War

In the years before and during World War II, millions of Germans left Germany and settled in the countries of Eastern Europe. Remember that during World War II, the Nazi regime in Germany conquered most of those Eastern European countries. After the war, millions of Germans were expelled from those nations and forced to return to Germany. Significantly, many expelled Germans had never lived in Germany. Their parents or grandparents had left Germany before they were even born. At the Potsdam Conference, the Allies recognized that Germans living in Poland, Czechoslovakia, and Hungary would have to be transferred back to Germany.
 * //Student Handout 2.1—Refugees in Europe//**

Respond to the following prompts in your groups: 1.If you had been the leader of an Eastern European nation controlled by Germany during World War II, would you have wanted Germans to remain in your country after the war? Why or why not? 2.What problems and/or challenges do you think that those Germans encountered after they were forced to leave their temporary homes in the Eastern European nations?

The Nazis killed the vast majority of the Jewish population of Europe during the Holocaust. The Allied Forces, however, liberated hundreds of thousands of Jews from concentration camps and death camps as they defeated the Germans. After liberation, these “survivors” had nowhere to go. Non-Jewish people had moved into the homes of Jews after they were forced into ghettos when Nazi rule began. Those occupants saw no reason to move out when the original residents returned. While many of those survivors hoped to move to Palestine, the British empire, which controlled the Palestinian territory at the time as a League of Nations Mandate, greatly limited the number of Jews that could enter. Consequently, many survivors ended up in Displaced Persons (DP) camps. Similarly to concentration and death camps, barbed-wire fences surrounded those DP camps. The camps’ residents lacked sufficient food. Though the camps served to house individuals with no homes, many died as a result of the terrible conditions in them.
 * Lesson 2**
 * //Student Handout 2.2—Jewish Refugees//**

In your group, respond to the following prompt: Do you think that DP camps that housed Jewish refugees are significant enough to the development of world history to be included in a one-year world history course? Why or why not? (Please be sure to support your answer thoughtfully, articulating the criteria that you weighed in considering the importance of this topic in relation to other material you have studied this year.)

1.Do you think that the countries of the world had any responsibilities towards refugees after World War II? Why or why not? 2.What kinds of responsibilities did the countries of the world have towards refugees? What kinds of responsibilities did they not have towards refugees? 3.Do you think that the countries of the world have a responsibility towards refugees today? Why or why not? (Identify at least three places in the world where refugees exist today.)
 * //Student Handout 2.3—The World’s Responsibility//**

Source: http://untreaty.un.org/cod/repertory/art1.htm
 * Please read the following text from Chapter 1, Article 1 of the United Nation’s charter. Then, respond to the prompts that follow:**

The Purposes of the United Nations are: 1.To maintain international peace and security, and to that end: to take effective collective measures for the prevention and removal of threats to the peace, and for the suppression of acts of aggression or other breaches of the peace, and to bring about by peaceful means, and in conformity with the principles of justice and international law, adjustment or settlement of international disputes or situations which might lead to a breach of the peace; 2.To develop friendly relations among nations based on respect for the principle of equal rights and self-determination of peoples, and to take other appropriate measures to strengthen universal peace; 3.To achieve international cooperation in solving international problems of an economic, social, cultural, or humanitarian character, and in promoting and encouraging respect for human rights and for fundamental freedoms for all without distinction as to race, sex, language, or religion; and 4.To be a center for harmonizing the actions of nations in the attainment of these common ends.

1.Explain each of the above clauses in your own words. 2.If you had been a citizen of the United States living in 1945, after the UN charter had been adopted, how would you have felt about it? Why? 3.Now look at these clauses from your real perspective today. What kind of meaning do you think these clauses have? Explain!
 * Questions:**