The timing of the riots varied from unit to unit. The Gauleiters started at about 10:30pm, only two hours after news of vom Rath’s death reached Germany. They were followed by the SA at 11pm, and the SS at around 1:20am.[citation needed] Most were wearing civilian clothes and were armed with sledgehammers and axes, and soon went to work on the destruction of Jewish property. The orders given to these men were very specific, however: no measures endangering non-Jewish German life or property were to be taken (synagogues too close to non-Jewish property were smashed rather than burned); Jewish businesses or dwellings could be destroyed but not looted; foreigners (even Jewish foreigners) were not to be the subjects of violence; and synagogue archives were to be transferred to the Sicherheitsdienst (SD). The men were also ordered to arrest as many Jews as the local jails would hold, the preferred targets being healthy young men.
The SA shattered the storefronts of about 7,500 Jewish stores and businesses, hence the appellation Kristallnacht (Crystal Night).[30] Jewish homes were ransacked all throughout Germany. Although violence against Jews had not been explicitly condoned by the authorities, there were cases of Jews being beaten or assaulted.
This pogrom damaged, and in many cases destroyed, about 200 synagogues (constituting nearly all Germany had), many Jewish cemeteries, more than 7,000 Jewish shops, and 29 department stores. Some Jews were beaten to death while others were forced to watch.[citation needed] More than 30,000 Jewish men were arrested and taken to concentration camps; primarily Dachau, Buchenwald, and Sachsenhausen.[31] The treatment of prisoners in the camps was brutal, but most were released during the following three months on condition that they leave Germany. The number of German Jews killed is uncertain. The number killed in the two-day riot is most often cited as 91. In addition, it is thought that there were hundreds of suicides.[citation needed] Counting deaths in the concentration camps, around 2,000–2,500 deaths were directly or indirectly attributable to the Kristallnacht pogrom. A few non-Jewish Germans, mistaken for Jews, were also killed.
He who FORGETS the past is condemned to relive it.
He who REMEMBERS the past, is condemned to watch idiots do the same thing over again.