How we cite our quotes: (Chapter.Paragraph)
Quote #7
[T]hey see us reduced to ignoble slavery, without hair, without honor and without names, beaten every day, more abject every day, and they never see in our eyes a light of rebellion, or of peace, or of faith. They know us as thieves and untrustworthy, muddy, ragged and starving, and mistaking the effect for the cause, they judge us worthy of our abasement. (12.20)
This is how the civilians that work outside of the camp see the prisoners. Are the Jews the way they are because of the prison, or are they in prison because of the way they are? (It's, of course, the former, but the civilians obviously don't think so, so they "confuse the effect for the cause," as Primo says).
Quote #8
The other patients looked at us with respectful curiosity: did we not know that patients were not allowed to leave Ka-Be? And if the Germans had not all left? But they said nothing, they were glad that someone was prepared to make the test. (17.46)
Even though all the SS have left the camp and have evacuated the healthy prisoners, the rules are still ingrained into the minds of those remaining. They have completely internalized the prohibitions against leaving the medical huts.
Quote #9
Liberty. The breach in the barbed wire gave us a concrete image of it. To anyone who stopped to think, it signified no more Germans, no more selections, no work, no blows, no roll-calls, and perhaps, later, the return.
But we had to make an effort to convince ourselves of it, and no one had time to enjoy the thought. All around lay destruction and death. (17.117-118)
Sadly, they're still imprisoned even though the camp is no longer under guard. This time, they're imprisoned by their own reactions to the death and destruction around them. They have not yet made the journey back to being "men."