Ghettoisation in Hungary – Budapest Ghetto

Fact of the Hungarian figure „Brick Factory in Obuda – The Holocaust in Hungary”

Part of the „The Holocaust” topic

The Holocaust in Hungary remains one of the most tragic episodes in the country’s history. Although Hungarian Jews had faced disenfranchisement and forced labor service, they lived in relative safety until the German military occupation on March 19, 1944. This occupation marked the beginning of the end for the Jewish population in Hungary. SS officer Adolf Eichmann was dispatched to oversee the rapid and systematic extermination of Hungarian Jews, a process tragically carried out with the collaboration of the Hungarian government and state authorities.

From April to May 1944, Jews were rounded up and locked in ghettos. In rural areas, they were taken to transportation camps, while urban Jews were confined to fenced-off neighborhoods, often referred to as ghettos. The ghettoization process was swift—by June, it had been implemented across most of Hungary. In Budapest, Jews were forced to live in designated ‘yellow-star houses,’ and it wasn’t until December 1944 that the ‘Great Ghetto’ was officially established. From May on, about 445-450 thousand of the collected Jews were deported to already established extermination and forced labor camps in Germany and Poland. Around 430 thousand of them were sent to the Auschwitz-Birkenau complex.

The deportation and ghettoization in Hungary were part of a broader, tragic network that spanned Central Europe. Neighboring countries, including Poland, Slovakia, and Romania, also saw the destruction of their Jewish populations through similar methods of ghettoization, forced labor, and mass deportation. This regional connection emphasizes that the Holocaust in Hungary was not an isolated event but rather a key part of the larger genocide orchestrated across Nazi-occupied Europe.