Nathan Israel Department Store

The Nathan Israel Department Store was a department store in Berlin. The business was started in 1815 by Nathan Israel as a small second-hand store in the Molkenmarkt. By 1925, it employed over 2,000 people and was a member of the Berlin Stock Exchange, and in the 1930s was one of the largest retail establishments in Europe. Because it was owned by Jews, the store was boycotted by the German government when the Nazi Party came to power in 1933. It was ransacked during the Kristallnacht in 1938 and then handed over to a non-Jewish family by the Nazis. The descendants of the original owners began to receive compensation for their losses after the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989.

At 10 a.m. on 1 April 1933, Nazi SA paramilitaries positioned themselves outside Jewish-owned businesses all over Germany to deter customers. Stormtroopers stood next to the main doors of the department store on Alexanderplatz, holding placards with the words: "Germans! Defend yourselves! Don't buy from Jews" .

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