Did Jewish families feel Nazi oppression was exceptional?

Question

I'm trying to compare the treatment of Jews in Europe before the rise of the Nazis with their treatment under the Nazis (before the concentration camps). Did Jewish communities feel that their oppressive treatment in say, 1938, was similar to oppression that occurred before the Nazis, or did they feel that the Nazi oppression was exceptional?

Answer 1

The Jewish Community did not feel that Nazi Oppression was exceptional in the sense that they had already seen a long history of oppression in Europe prior to the Nazi Period. The Jews had many disagreements with their Christian neighbors in Europe that date back to the Middle Ages. The governments of European countries had already conducted several expulsions, and regularly denied rights to the Jews that were afforded to non-Jewish citizens. Futhermore, the European attitude towards Jews has mostly been that they were undesirable people that were living in their midst.

What made the Nazi policies particularly extreme to the Jews were the extermination programs that were implemented at the death camps. This was the first time that a systematic rounding up and killing of the Jews had occured to such a great magnitude that it wiped out a large number of the Jewish population.