Holocaust scholars examined the origins of the Holocaust in German society and the role of German citizens in executing millions of Jews. They discussed how German anti-Semitism in the pre-Nazi period conditioned people for the physical elimination of Jews and how German citizens could become perpetrators of mass murder. The conference was organized to discuss Daniel Goldhagen’s new book, Hitler’s Willing Executioners: Ordinary Germans and the Holocaust, which examines how three groups of “ordinary Germans,” those in reserve police battalions, work camps and on death marches, could brutally murder thousands of Jews.