"We appear to be treating the Jews as the Nazis treated them, except that we don't exterminate them.”
After the end of the war, 1.5 to 2 million
people could not or would not return to their homes due to either destruction
of their homes or for fear of annihilation by their communities or families.
Of these millions of people about 10 percent of them were Jewish. And in order to give those millions of people
a place to stay after the war. The United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administrations (UNRA) were given responsibility for these people, but the relief they gave was hardly mediocre. At
first the displaced people lived behind barbed wire fences, with guards patrolling
the area, in the same camps that were not too long ago controlled by the Nazis as concentration camps. Unfortunately
these camps were horribly taken care of and as Earl G. Harrison, President
Truman's representative, wrote after having visited those camps "We appear
to be treating the Jews as the Nazis treated them, except that we don't
exterminate them.” The obligation was handed over to Allied military units. By the spring of 1945 seven million DP’s lives were in the hands of Allied military units. The
DPs wished to go home, but often their homes, and everything they had ever know
was gone, so they had no choice but to stay in the DP camps. These people were
almost all unhealthy, physically and mentally. The survivors had horrible
nightmares and could not shake the memories of the war. Because the camps were
occupied by so many helpless people and Harrison’s and many others speeches were heard around the world, they understood that they needed to make the camps safer. American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee, the Organization for Rehabilitation through Training, and other relief agencies helped this cause by improving the living areas, providing education, and occupational training. These agencies helped so many people get back on their feet, even though the DP camps were still not very healthy places. Jews were moved into separate camps in order for their special needs that their religion required, to be able to be upheld. Although the memories were still there, people began to realize that there could in fact be a future. Survivors married, and new lives were formed. Quite a few newspapers and magazines were available within the camps and through out the world, so that communication was able to be open and flowing between the camps and the outside world so that everyone would know what was going on.