Established in 1941, Theresienstadt (Terezín in Czech) was located in the territory of the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia, part of prewar Czechoslovakia (note: Czechoslovakia has since been split into the Czech Republic and Slovakia).
While propaganda promoted Theresienstadt as a “model community,” in reality it was a transit camp, labor camp, and a ghetto. Of the 140,000 people who were deported to Theresienstadt, approximately 33,000 died there.
In June 1944, after enormous pressure from the Danish government, the Nazis agreed to have representatives from both the Danish Red Cross and the International Red Cross visit Theresienstadt.
What they saw was all a well-orchestrated deception. To prepare for the visit, gardens were planted, barracks were renovated, cafes were opened, and signs went up throughout the ghetto; this was all to portray the ghetto as a model village. Prior to the visit, deportations were intensified to empty out the overcrowded ghetto.
The Nazis created unparalleled deception through propaganda. A film was created about the Red Cross visit, and the Nazis used it to help illustrate how well the Jews were being treated. After production on the film stopped, the cast members and director—all inmates of Theresienstadt—were deported to Auschwitz-Birkenau, one of the five Nazi death camps, where more than one million Jews perished.
Source: Holocaust Encyclopedia. United States Holocaust Memorial Museum.