How does Elie Wiesel's Night explore dehumanization?

explores the concept of
dehumanization through the narrative about the degradation the Jews face at the hands of their
captors and each other. In the memoir, Elie relates the circumstances of his situation once he
and his father leave the ghetto at Sighet, and he describes how, in an instant, they went from
being treated like people to being treated like animals.

The Jews are loaded
onto cattle cars, packed with nearly 80 people together, to be shipped toward Auschwitz. The
close quarters are not considered that bad until the train crosses over the Hungarian-Czech
border. Once clear out of Hungary, the pretense of relocation is lost, and the Jews find
themselves not only being treated like animals but actually called animals by the Nazi soldiers.
In chapter 2 Wiesel writes,

The Hungarian lieutenant went
around with a basket and retrieved the last possessions from those who chose not to go on
tasting the bitterness of fear. "There are eighty of you in the car," the German
officer added. "If anyone goes missing, you will all be shot, like dogs."

The German officer telling the Jews that they will be shot like
dogs is the first indication that they are no longer going to be treated as human beings. That
treatment continues well into their journey into Auschwitz, where babies are shot, women are
murdered, and the dead are piled into mass graves. Anyone who is too sick to work is almost
immediately killed, showing that the Jews's only worth in the eyes of the Nazi regime lies in
their ability to work.

The dehumanization progresses rapidly in the memoir,
and it is powerfulso powerful that it eventually begins to work on the Jews themselves. They
ultimately dehumanize each other to the point that they mistreat each other. It isnt a knock
against the Jews in the storythey are forced by their circumstances to fight to survivebut it
does speak to the power of the dehumanization the Nazis have created in the concentration
camps.

Elies description of the way the dead are treated shows how
desperation has driven the Jews to dehumanize each other,

The living were glad. They would have more room. Volunteers began the task. They
touched those who had remained on the ground. "Here's one! Take him!" The volunteers
undressed him and eagerly shared his garments. Then, two "gravediggers" grabbed him by
the head and feet and threw him from the wagon, like a sack of flour.

The story of how the bodies are disposed of shows the mindset of
survival in the camps: the Jews who survive dont have it in them to care about others,
especially those who are dead, because they have to worry about themselves. The Nazis, in
treating the Jews like they are less than human, ultimately push them to act like they are less
than humana theme that Elie struggles with through the closing section of the
book.