File:Judenboykott 1933-04 Anti-Semitic Nazi boycott of Jewish businesses shops Berlin SA Sturmabteilung propaganda terror action Marching parade brownshirts Posters Kauft nicht bei Juden Hemdenmatz Narodowe Archiwum Cyfrowe 3 1 0 17.jpg

English: In April 1933, the National Socialists in NSDAP initiated an anti-Jewish/anti-Semitic boycott against Jewish shops and businesses in Germany. This early labeling and harassment of Jewish-owned businesses were stark examples of the discrimination and persecution of Germany's Jewish population 1933–1945 and an important step on the way to the later enactment of anti-Semitic laws in Nazi Germany 1933–1945 and ultimately the Holocaust in Europe.

• Nazi propaganda photo of uniformed members of the SA (Sturmabteilung), the paramilitary 'brownshirts' of the Nazi Party, demonstrating and protesting against Jewish-owned business in Berlin on April 1, 1933. The storm troopers are marching in the street with a campaign signboard/placard hanging around their necks. The Anti-Jewish slogan printed in Fraktur typeface on the posters reads: Deutsche! Wehrt Euch! Kauft nicht bei Juden! (Germans! Protect yourselves! Don't buy from Jews!' ) The city's inhabitants and people on the sidewalk are watching the activist parade. Shop windows and signs in the background, including with the text: "Möbel" ('Furniture'); "Total Ausverkauf" ('Total sell-out'); "Hemdenmatz" (owned by mr Schaub and mr Stein from Poland) ; "Pelze" ('Furs'), etc.

The press photo has been retouched with paint to stand out more clearly in print.

• The Nazi boycott of Jewish businesses (German: Judenboykott) in Germany began on Saturday April 1, 1933, and was claimed to be a defensive reaction to the international anti-Nazi boycott, which had been initiated in March 1933.

It was largely unsuccessful, as the German population continued to use Jewish businesses, but revealed the intent of the Nazis to undermine the viability of Jews in Germany. It was an early governmental action against the Jews of Germany by the new National Socialist government, which culminated in the "Final Solution". It was a state-managed campaign of ever-increasing harassment, arrests, systematic pillaging, forced transfer of ownership to Nazi Party activists (managed by the Chamber of Commerce, Industrie- und Handelskammer), and ultimately murder of Jewish business owners. In Berlin alone, there were 50,000 Jewish-owned businesses.

Already on March 28, the National Socialist Kampfbund for the Commercial Middle Class (Nationalsozialistischer Kampfbund für den gewerblichen Mittelstand), under Adrian von Renteln, had advanced and occupied or sealed off Jewish shops in Kiel, the Ruhr area, and in some cities in Brandenburg. On April 1, 1933, a Saturday, at 10 o'clock - in some places already the evening before - the actual boycott began. Uniformed, sometimes armed SA (Sturmabteilung), HJ (Hitler Youth), and Stahlhelm guards stood outside Jewish shops, medical practices, and law offices all over German cities, preventing potential customers from entering all day long. Signs and posters demanded: 'Germans! Defend yourselves! Don't buy from Jews! - The Jews are our misfortune! - Avoid Jewish doctors! - Don't go to Jewish lawyers!' (Deutsche! Wehrt euch! Kauft nicht bei(m) Juden! – Die Juden sind unser Unglück! – Meidet jüdische Ärzte! – Geht nicht zu jüdischen Rechtsanwälten!) Other uniformed members of the same groups spread these slogans with chants and loudspeaker vans in the streets.

• See Footage of SA activists shouting anti-Jewish slogans, etc. (vimeo.com), Nazi Germany Stages Jewish Boycott - 1933 (British Movietone report/newsreel on Youtube), Joseph Goebbels' propaganda speech on the Anti-Jewish boycott (archive.org), etc.

• Copy of photo from the National Digital Archives in Poland (Narodowe Archiwum Cyfrowe), published under a Public domain license, allowing copying, modification, distribution, and performance of the work, even for commercial purposes, without requiring permission.