Allies: The twenty-six nations, led by the United States, Great Britain, and the Soviet Union, who united to oppose the Axis powers--Germany, Italy, Japan, and their allies, in the Second World War.

Annihilation: The act or process of being completely destroyed.

Aryan: A central myth of the Nazi ideology was the belief in Aryan racial superiority. An Aryan was supposed to be a person of pure Teutonic German background with distinct racial characteristics including fair skin. The Nazi extermination policy was enacted to eliminate those races deemed inferior or threatening to Aryan racial purity.

Auschwitz-Birkenau: The largest of the Nazi death camps which was located in southwestern Poland near the city of Krakow. As the Nazis perfected assembly line killing, they constructed death camps to be able to kill large numbers of people more efficiently.

Bergen-Belsen: A concentration camp in northern Germany for the detainment of prisoners of war and other "exchangeable" prisoners.   Anne and Margot Frank were among the over 30,000 people who died of starvation or disease in Bergen Belsen.

Bystanders: A person who is present at an event, but who does not participate in, or object to, what is happening.

Call-up notice: A government order to report to the military or police. During the Nazi era a call-up notice could mean anything from reporting to work to being deported to death camps. Rather than report to the authorities, the Franks went into hiding when Margot Frank received a call-up notice.

Deportation: The forced removal of Jews from their homes in Nazi-occupied countries under the pretext that they would be resettled in the east. Most were deported via cattle cars to concentration and death camps.

Dissent: To differ in opinion or feeling; disagree. The refusal to conform to the authority or doctrine of an established cultural, political or religious group. Under a totalitarian dictatorship like Nazi Germany, dissent was eliminated by instilling terror in the general population, and by jailing political opponents.

Euthanasia: The action of killing an individual for reasons considered to be merciful. The Nazi euthanasia program was designed to kill people who were considered undesirable because of physical or mental infirmities.

Final Solution: A Nazi euphemism for their plan to annihilate the Jews.

Forced labor camps: Camps where prisoners were used as slave labor. Mauthausen in Austria is an example of one.

Genocide: From the word genus (race) and (cide) killing. It refers to the intentional, systematic murder of all of the people in a targeted group.

Gestapo: The Secret Police of the Third Reich, which used terror and torture to eliminate political opposition in Germany. The Gestapo also orchestrated the arrest and deportation of Jews.

Gypsies: The nomadic Roma or Sinti people.  They had been discriminated against for centuries and the Nazis considered them to be an inferior race.  They persecuted and murdered hundreds of thousands of Gypsies during World War II.

Hidden Children: Jewish children who were hidden from the Nazis during World War II. Anne Frank’s situation was unusual in that she was able to hide with her entire family and remain in one place for over two years. Most children were separated from family members and had to move frequently.

Holocaust: From the term ‘total burnt offering’. The systematic, state-directed, genocide of six million Jews, as well as the murder of five million other civilians, including Slavs, gypsies and others, during World War II.

Human Rights: The rights one has because one is a human being. These rights include the right to life, to freedom and to human dignity.

Kristallnacht: The state-sponsored pogrom unleashed by the Nazis onto the Jewish communities in Germany and Austria on November 9^th and 10^th, 1938, that included the vandalism and burning of Jewish shops. Ten thousand Jewish men and boys were arrested and sent to concentration camps.

Mein Kampf (My Struggle): Adolf Hitler’s autobiography, written during his imprisonment in 1924. Mein Kampf details his plan to restore Germany to its former greatness and to make Europe judenrein.

National Socialist German Workers’ Party: The Nazi Party, a right wing, anti-Semitic, nationalist party led by Adolf Hitler from 1921-1945.

Nuremberg Laws: Racial laws, passed in the fall of 1935 in Germany, which sripped Jews of their political and civil rights by making them non-citizens. As the Nazi armies advanced in Europe, racial laws were instituted in the occupied countries. Anne Frank describes in her diary the effect that these laws had on her life in Holland.

Occupation: Control of a country by a foreign military power. The Netherlands was occupied by the Nazis from 1940-45.

Prejudice: Pre-judging. Negative opinions about another individual or group which derive from stereotypical ideas one has about that person or group.

Refugee: A person who flees his/her native country to escape invasion, oppression or persecution.

Scapegoat: An individual or group of people who are blamed for the actions of others.

SS (Schutzstaffel): Hitler’s black-shirted, elite guards.  They also ran the concentration and death camps.

Swastika: A hooked cross that became the official symbol of the Nazi Party. Originally an ancient religious symbol, the swastika is still used by neo-Nazi groups.

Third Reich: Nazi term for Germany and the Nazi-occupied territories in Europe from 1933-1945. Nazi propaganda stated that there would be a Nazi dominated 1000 year Reich that would control the world.

Totalitarianism: The total control of all the aspects of life, of a people or state, by one person or party. Opposing parties are not permitted to exist.

Underground: A term used in reference to being in hiding, as in "going underground." The term is also used to describe groups acting in secret to oppose the government or resist the occupying enemy forces.

Westerbork: A transit camp for Dutch Jews in Holland. Between 1942 and 1944, about 100,000 Jews, including all those who were hiding in the Secret Annex, were transported from Westerbork to concentration and death camps.

Yellow star: The six-pointed Star of David is the Jewish symbol that the Nazis forced all Jews, above the age of six, to wear as a mark of shame, and to make them visible. In the Netherlands the star carried the Dutch word Jood, meaning "Jew".