Operation Margarethe

On 19 March 1944, Nazi Germany launched Operation Margarethe, occupying Hungary to prevent Regent Miklós Horthy from negotiating a separate peace. German control enabled the rapid implementation of the Final Solution: the Jewish Council was established, yellow-star decrees issued, property seized, and ghettos created across six zones. Within weeks, mass deportations began; between May and July 1944, over 430,000 Jews—mostly from the provinces—were sent to Auschwitz-Birkenau, where the vast majority were murdered on arrival. German occupation marked the swift, catastrophic destruction of Hungarian Jewry.