Courcelles massacre
The Courcelles massacre (), sometimes known as the Rognac massacre (Tuerie du Rognac), involved the killing of 27 civilians in a number of separate instances by a collaborationist militia associated with the Rexist Party in German-occupied Belgium during World War II. The killings occurred on 17–18 August 1944 near Courcelles, a suburb of the industrial city of Charleroi in Hainaut Province, shortly before the Liberation of Belgium in revenge for the killing of a Rexist official by the Belgian Resistance. Background Rex and German-occupied Belgium At the time of the German invasion in May 1940, Belgium had several political parties that were broadly sympathetic to the authoritarian and anti-democratic ideals represented by Nazi Germany. In Wallonia and Brussels, the largest of these groups was the Rexist Party, led by Léon Degrelle. This had originated as a faction of the mainstream Catholic Block, but split in 1935 to form an independent populist party. Ideologically, Rex supported Belgian nationalism, but its support for corporatism and anti-communism made it sympathetic towards aspects of Nazi ideology. It achieved some early success, peaking at the elections of 1936 in which it received 11.5 percent of the national vote, but experienced a decline in the following