Xenophobia Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

Xenophobia - Essay Example However, unlike the Holocaust which built up gradually from Fascist ideas developed by Hitler and his followers in the years after the First World War, and what was seen as the humiliation of the German people, ( The Israeli- American Co-operative 2011) it could be argued that one incident sparked the Rwandan atrocities. The Hutu uprising against their countrymen was triggered when Juvenal Habyarimana, a Hutu, and at that time the Rwandan president, was killed when he was in a plane which was shot down during a rocket attack near Kigali airport on 6th April 1994. The blame was placed firmly on the shoulders of Tutsi leader Paul Kagame, who is now the current Rwandan President, but then leader of the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF), (BBC News and Le Monde 2004). This was denied by Kagame who blamed the attack on Hutu extremists. Nevertheless, within a few hours of the attack, violence broke out all over the country; and such violence would not wane until three months after the assassination of Habyarimana. By then nearly a million Rwandans would lose their lives. The persecution of the Jews began in the early 1930’s. when Adolf Hitler became chancellor of Germany in 1933. The persecution he engendered continued and built up into and through World War II., finally ceasing in 1945 when war in Europe finally ended. .It is believed that some 6 million Jews died , as well as members of other minorities such as Gypsies. Others were tortured or suffered in other ways and some 5000 Jewish communities were totally destroyed. ( Nazi Germany 1933-1941) The deaths did not begin as soon as the Fascists came to power. Time was spent first in spreading propaganda across Germany against those seen by the government as the enemies of the Aryan race, a the same time making life very difficult for the minority group. The aim was to encourage Jews to leave the country and to some extent this succeeded, but Hitler could not wait and in 1938 came Kristallnacht - state