Suicidal Jews: How do we explain the group suicide of liberal Jews?

When individuals kill themselves, we look for answers in their DNA, their environments, their personal reactions to feelings of impotent rage, rejection, disappointment, heartbreak, and mental illness. But how to explain group suicide? There are numerous examples, going back to 206 B.C., and these relatively recent cases:In 1943, in the final phase of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising, many of the Jewish fighters besieged in the “bunker” at Miła 18 committed mass suicide by ingesting poison rather than surrender to the Nazis.In 1945, about 1,000 residents of Demmin, Germany, committed mass suicide after the Red Army had sacked the town.In 1978,...