Answers to Questions by Yair Davidiy
What was Hitler's objective for invading North Africa?
The Germans had conquered the western portion of continental Europe. They were about to engage the British RAF over which they had a numerical advantage and thought they would win.
The Italians were already in North Africa. The Vichy French collaborators of Germany were in Syria and Lebanon.
The British defeated the Italians and the Germans came in to help them. This chain of events determined the timing of an attempted German advance eastward.
Its conception was consistent with overall German strategy.
In June 1940 the Battle of Britain and the subsequent refusal of Franco to join the Axis indicated that Germany might be defeated. The War Aims of killing the Jews received a new priority.
A conquest of Russia (and its geo-political economic hinterland) may have been perceived as the last chance for victory Germany had.
In June 1941 the invasion of Russia began but it had been planned long before then.
The Germans wished to kill the Jews in North Africa and Palestine, take over the Middle East, and have the option of linking up from the south with their forces in Russia.
 Iran and Iraq had pro-German governments. Turkey was also expected to join the German forces.
In June-July, 1941, the British conquered Lebanon and Syria and the threat from the Vichi French who had been there was removed.
Meanwhile (in February 1941) the Germans under Rommel had arrived in North Africa after their Italian allies in Libya had invaded Egypt and been driven back with enormous losses.
The Wannsee Conference was held on January 20 1942. The policy of extermination the Jews however had been in place before then, even from the beginning.
# In archival research in 2006, it emerged that the SS "Einsatzgruppe Egypten" (Einsatzgruppe Egypt) was deployed to Athens for attachment to the Afrika Korps in the expected conquest of Mandatory Palestine. #
There was a fear of the Germans breaking through the Russian lines and advancing via Syria towards Palestine. This was combined with the fear of defeat of the allies in North Africa and a consequent advance of Rommel via Egypt.
The British and Jews in Palestine prepared themselves for a possible Last Stand in the region of Haifa in northern Palestine.
# The "Plan of the North" was also called "Masada on the Carmel", and "Haifa-Masada-Musah Dag".[5] (The British plan was called Palestine Final Fortress.)
See:
Palestine Final Fortress
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pa...200 days of dread
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/20...
Eventually, the Allies defeated the Axis in Egypt and stopped them there. They removed the menace of German proxies in the Middle East by invading Iran, Iraq, Syria, and Lebanon. The Russians stopped the German advance in southern Russia.
The threat was averted but it had existed.
The German threat to the Jews of Palestine had been advancing from every direction. The invasion of North Africa had been part of this.