Amon Goeth In Steven Spielberg's Holocaust

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Amon Goeth nicknamed the Butcher of Płaszów killed thousands of Jews in the Płaszów concentration camp in southwestern Poland. Goeth was considered a ruthless commandment of the camp, but also a friend of industrialist Oskar Schindler. Amon Leopold Goeth was born in Vienna, Austria on December 1908. Goeth was the only child of Catholic publishers, Bertha and Amon Goeth. Growing up Goeth went to a private Catholic elementary school and was not considered a good student. His parent eventually sent him to a strict Catholic boarding school in the countryside. Against his parents wishes, Amon left the boarding school at the end of tenth grade. At seventeen, Goeth was fascinated by right wing ideas (Teege, 29). Goeth then joined the Nazi youth …show more content…

This time is portrayed in Steven Spielberg’s Holocaust film Schindler’s List. Płaszów was being built at the time of the liquidation of the Krakow ghetto. This is when Goeth starts to look for a maid to live in his villa overlooking the camp. He did not want “someone else’s maid” and picked a young girl named Helena Hirsch (Rosenzweig in Teege’s book). Afterwards he orders the death of a civil engineering graduate, Diana Reiter, because she said the foundation was not poured properly. Goeth then ordered for the foundation to be re-poured after she is killed. He gives a speech and says the six centuries of a Jewish Krakow will no longer exist. The next scene he is seen on his balcony with his gun waiting for a Jew not working fast enough. In the next scene Amon Goeth and Oskar Schindler first met, according to the movie. Schindler explains to Goeth his business is failing because he does not have access to his workers who are in his camp. Amon was able to compromise with Schindler allowing him access to workers under the supervision of his officers. Goeth talked to Itzhak Stern, Schindler’s accountant, to help manage his finances because Goeth is getting compensation from Schindler. When Goeth goes to the factory to examine a worker making hinges he gets upset when the worker had not made enough hinges despite working …show more content…

Those who lived in the camp were lucky enough to survive four weeks. Goeth used collective punishments on a daily basis. Groups of workers would report the number killed when they passed each other. On Yom Kippur 1943, Goeth and his officers took fifty Jews from their barracks and shot them. Prisoners were also publicly hung while 15,000 inmates would be lined up watching. Moshe Beijski, a Schindler Jew, said about the camp commandment punishments, “The case of Olmer, whose daughter lives in Jerusalem, and I know her ... He was summoned by the Camp Commandant Amon Goeth. The Camp Commandant had two dogs, Ralf and Rolf, and he set the dogs on him. The dogs ate him up alive. Possibly a little breath still remained in him. He shot him and he was killed…,” (The Nazi Butcher Amon Goeth). Another prisoner Joseph Bau said the commandment, “Once he caught a boy who was sick with diarrhea and was unable to restrain himself. Göth forced him to eat all the excrement and then shot him,” (Amon Göth). Emilie Schindler, Oskar Schindler’s wife, described Amon Goeth as having split personality (Teege 28). Helena Rosenzweig, Amon’s maid, called him a monster saying he had the urge to kill people (Teege,

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