It is the same Nazi story again... "In 1919 Adolf Hitler wrote of his desire for the complete removal of Jews from Germany, and his belief that methodical measures were needed in order to achieve that goal. By the mid-1930s, the SS had transformed that theoretical goal into a policy that called for a Germany physically “cleansed” (Judenrein), or "free of Jews” (Judenfrei). After the annexation of Austria (Anschluss) in March 1938 and even more so after the Kristallnacht pogrom of

November 1938, the Nazis began pressuring Jews to emigrate.

Soon after the Germans invaded Poland in September 1939, they began implementing the first stage of deportation, by forcing Jews out of their homes and into Ghettos. There were also attempts to drive the Jews into Soviet territory. The Nazis then decided to deport all the Jews living within the Reich to an area in Poland's generalgouvernement called the Lublin Reservation.

This scheme was part of the Nazis' larger plan to relocate the populations of Europe. Besides these designs for the Jews, they intended to remove many Poles from Poland, and resettle the area with ethnic Germans (Volksdeutsche), primarily from the Soviet Union. Adolf Eichmann was placed in charge of the deportations of Jews and Poles, as the SS expert on "Jewish

affairs and evacuations." However, the so-called Nisko and Lublin plan faltered. Germany's resettlement plans halted completely in mid-1941, during preparations to invade the Soviet Union. Thus, Hitler's goal to expel all Jews from German-occupied areas had not yet been achieved.

The next stage of deportation emerged as the result of a shift in the Nazi's Jewish policy from expulsion to mass extermination."

-- Yad Vashem