Operation “Reinhard”

Code name for a campaign beginning in the fall of 1941 aimed at the systematic murder of all Jews living in the Generalgouvernement. Named after Reinhard Heydrich, one of the key architects of the "Final Solution," Operation "Reinhard" (Aktion Reinhard) mandated the most deadly phase of the Holocaust.

Between 1942 and 1943, 1.7 million Jews were murdered in the three killing centers at Belzec, Sobibor, and Treblinka, which were established under Operation "Reinhard" and which drew personnel and experience in systematic mass murder from the T4 "euthanasia" program in Germany.

Operation "Reinhard" killing centers in the Generalgouvernement, 1942.

United States Holocaust Memorial Museum