Angela Merkel set to visit Auschwitz for first time

Auschwitz-Birkenau was the largest Nazi extermination camp in which at least one million Jews were gassed en masse.

By World Israel News Staff

German Chancellor Angela Merkel will be visiting Auschwitz-Birkenau for the first time, German newspaper Sueddeutsche Zeitung reported.

According to the report, Merkel will visit the site’s main death camp on Dec. 6 and participate in a ceremony marking the 10th anniversary of the Auschwitz-Birkenau Foundation, whose purpose is to preserve the authenticity of the site.

Since the end of the Holocaust in 1945, Helmut Schmidt and Helmut Kohl were the only German chancellors to have visited the infamous death camp.

In 2015, Merkel became the first German chancellor to visit the Dachau concentration camp, and in 2009 she visited Buchenwald, accompanied by former U.S. President Barack Obama.

Auschwitz-Birkenau was the largest Nazi extermination camp in which at least one million Jews were gassed en masse.

Each of the four gas chambers in the death camp had the capacity to kill 6,000 Jews daily. They were built to look like shower rooms. Upon arrival, those who were sent to die were told by the Nazis that they were being sent to work but first needed to shower and be disinfected.

Attacks on Jews, Muslims and other minorities have increased in recent years in Germany. Germany’s Federal Criminal Police Office said at the end of October that they had identified 43 far-right extremists whom they consider a serious threat, an increase of about a third since the start of the year.

Overall, authorities say there are some 12,700 far-right extremists in Germany “prepared to use violence.”

Merkel’s Cabinet passed new measures in October to help fight far-right extremism and anti-Semitism in the country. Proposals include tightening gun laws, stepping up prosecution of online hate, and boosting financial support for projects fighting the growing threat.

Associated Press contributed to this report.