The Third Reich’s concentration camps have been defended as an institution by Heinrich Himmler, head of the Gestapo (Secret State police) and the Schutz Staffel (Chancellor Hitler’s black shirted elite guards.)
He explained in an address to foreign correspondents:
"This institution is completely misunderstood abroad. They are necessary for two groups: firstly, for those stimulating crime — the typical underworlders, who are mainly Jews and half-Jews; secondly, for a large percentage of persons with a hereditary disposition for crime. The door of the concentration camps will never open for those persons since the Reich must be protected against them."
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
