ETYM Latin holocaustum, Greek, burnt whole; olos whole + kaystos burnt, from kaiein to burn; cf. Caustic: cf. French holocauste.
An act of great destruction and loss of life.
Burned-offering of whole animal; wholesale destruction or death.

The, The annihilation of an estimated 6 million Jews by the Hitler regime 1933–45 in the numerous extermination and concentration camps, most notably Auschwitz, Sobibor, Treblinka, and Maidanek in Poland, and Belsen, Buchenwald, and Dachau in Germany. An additional 10 million people died during imprisonment or were exterminated, among them were Ukrainian, Polish, and Russian civilians and prisoners of war, Romanies, socialists, homosexuals, and others (labeled “defectives”). Victims were variously starved, tortured, experimented on, and worked to death. Millions were executed in gas chambers, shot, or hanged. It was euphemistically termed the final solution (of the Jewish question).
Holocaust museums and memorial sites have been established in Israel and in other countries.