This is a great article and I am definitely going to get the book.
When Jews did have weapons, they were able to do a lot of damage to the Nazis.
"The
first assault on the Republic, however, came not from the right but
from the communist left. Under the leadership of Rosa Luxembourg and
Karl Liebknecht, the German Communists attempted to overthrow the
government by armed struggle. The fragile government mobilized the
Freikorps, undisciplined militias composed largely of veterans. The
Freikorps brutally put down the communist insurrection and murdered its
leaders. The Communists had also seized the government in Bavaria and
the Freikorps succeeded in vanquishing them."
"Hoping
to stem further attacks on the state, the liberal Weimar Republic
imposed Draconian gun control laws that made it punishable by death to
carry a gun."
"Gestapo legal adviser Werner Best proposed to execute Jews who were found in possession of firearms.
He had both ample precedent and experience to draw upon from the harsh
gun laws and their brutal enforcement in the Weimar Republic."
"In 1938, in preparation for Kristallnacht
(November 9-10, 1938), the Gestapo used the Weimar gun registration
records to disarm Jews and focused on Jewish gun owners for deportation
to concentration camps."
YET:
"Throughout
their conquest of Europe, the Nazis encountered armed resistance by
those who refused to accept defeat. Even the pitifully armed Jews of the
Warsaw Ghetto put up meaningful resistance, as did the Jewish Bielski
partisans in the forests of Byelorussia and Poland. Among the conquered
people of Europe, where there were arms and munitions there were
partisans who continued to fight."
