The Expulsion of Polish Jews From Nazi Germany: Polenaktion Explained

In the early hours of October 28, 1938, Berlin resident Mendel Max Karp was still sleeping when police officers burst into his apartment to order him to leave the territory of the German Reich. He was then arrested and deported to the German-Polish border on a special train. Mr. Karp was one of the many Jews of Polish nationality forcibly expelled by the Nazi regime between October 27 and 29, 1938. As the Polish government refused them entry into their home country, the Polish Jews lived for months in hastily built refugee camps. The campaign, known as Polenaktion (Polish Action), was the first mass deportation of Jewish people from the Reich.