by Tec, Nechama
Another more dangerous collaborator was Yakov Lejkin. A converted Jew, he was known as a corrupt and enthusiastic supporter of the Nazis. Lejkin was assassinated during the Warsaw ghetto deportations. His killer was never identified.67 Next, the ghetto underground had ordered the killing of Alfred Nossig. Born in Lwow, Nossig was a journalist and a sculptor. After his assassination, some ghetto inmates had guessed ŻOB’s involvement. The majority had approved of this act, yet hardly anyone spoke about it. Discretely, ŻOB continued to pursue its preparatory cleansing activities.68
To function more effectively this ghetto underground had to reconcile a range of differences among diverse groups. Eventually it included all major political and social streams of Jewish life. One conspicuous division, however, was with the ŻZW, who were well equipped because of their former connection to the Polish Army and therefore did not need to join the other Jewish undergrounds. Relatively less evidence is available about the ŻZW than about the ŻOB. According to some sources, the ŻZW had three hundred fighters, all of whom were well armed.
In the bunker, one of Ringelblum’s writing projects was a portrait of Mordechai Anielewicz, the twenty-five-year-old former leader of the Hashomer Hatzair group, a leftist political organization (figure 2.4). Ringelblum was impressed with Mordechai’s idealism and with his devotion to his young followers. Anielewicz was also aware of Hashomer Hatzair’s pro-Soviet orientations and how these might extend to ŻOB and to the PPR, the Polish Workers Party. He was interested in how diverse political systems were connected to Russian politics. Anielewicz cultivated his ties to the Polish Scout Organization. He was a quiet leader, willing to learn from his followers.
Early on, as the head of the Hashomer Hatzair youth group, Anielewicz had traveled to a number of ghettos, urging other Jewish youths to join them. These trips offered opportunities for the exchange of ideas within wider circles of young people. Such travels, however, were dangerous. The Nazis imposed the death sentence upon Jews found outside of the ghetto without special authorizations. The same punishment applied to Christian Poles who knowingly helped Jews move or stay outside of a ghetto.69
FIGURE 2.4 Mordechai Anielewicz (standing, far right) with other members of the Zionist youth movement in Hashomer Hatzair. Anielewicz was the head of the Jewish Fighting Organization (ŻOB), and one of the leaders in the Warsaw ghetto uprising. (United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, courtesy of Leah Hammerstein Silverstein)
Despite these risks, Anielewicz and many of his colleagues continued their tours, eluding the authorities’ watchful eyes. They shared an eagerness to learn about the fate of the Jewish people. These trips offered fresh insights into the deteriorating conditions under which ghetto inmates were forced to live. Significantly, too, such travels confirmed to Anielewicz and the young leaders who had crossed their paths that worse was to come. Indeed, news about future anti-Jewish measures continued to spread. Soon added to this general news were more specific reports about the murder of the Vilna ghetto inmates’ deportations from a number of ghettos: Slonim, Novogrodek, Lida, Lublin, and many others. Figuring prominently were details about the Warsaw ghetto deportations. Anielewicz and his comrades concluded that all Polish Jews were destined for annihilation.
He and many of his young colleagues agreed that they had to settle a central question: What kind of a death should the Polish Jews select for themselves? Should they face death in a passive way, without engaging in resistance, or should they stand up to their oppressors?
After the end of the big Warsaw ghetto deportations, Anielewicz and other young leaders insisted that in the future the killing of Polish Jews should not be made easy for the Germans. A consensus emerged that in the future the Germans would pay a high price for their crimes.
The moment Anielewicz turned from passivity to active resistance, all preoccupation with the promotion of cultural and artistic pastimes retreated into the background. These activities no longer seemed to matter. Also put to rest were endless debates between the youthful political leaders and the older Jews. From earlier discussions with the older generation, Anielewicz had learned that the more experienced Jewish leaders were opposed to fighting the Germans because they recognized that Jews would not survive direct confrontations with the occupiers. Unlike Anielewicz and his followers, they were ready to do all that was in their power to protect and prolong their lives. The young expected the Germans to murder them all; this was an inevitable fact. For them the question was how to die an honorable death.70 And so, the young fighters did not try to get illegal documents nor did they look for safe haven in the Christian world. Faced with annihilation, they remained idealistic. They had no wives or children. Their goal was to connect and to cooperate with others who were also ready to fight. In times of disasters one should not be concerned with committees and propositions.71 At such times, one had to rely on instinct.
Ringelblum felt that initially Jewish youths were too disciplined, and therefore incapable of assessing clearly their circumstances. To Ringelblum, this seemed to be one of the basic reasons why, during the Warsaw ghetto deportations, so many Jews lost their lives while their Nazi oppressors did not even pay with one dead German. This truth dawned on the young only when it was too late—after most of the Warsaw Jewry had already been murdered in Treblinka.
Still, as far as the preparations for resistance were concerned, Anielewicz threw himself into this job. Together with other groups and other political parties, he reorganized the Jewish underground. All who knew Anielewicz concur that he was one of the most dedicated activists in the movement. He bore no resemblance to other leaders, who would send others into the line of fire and distance themselves from a fight.
The ghetto deportations were followed by a flood of self-accusations about Jewish passivity and complicity. Such reactions led to growing involvement with Jewish resistance. Attached to this was a growing interest, verging on an obsession, to build more sophisticated hiding places. Practically all of the remaining Jews wanted to participate, as Israel Gutman insists, “in the construction of shelters and secret places that would prolong Jewish lives.”72
Many of the ghetto activities were dictated by darkness, which practically guaranteed an absence of Germans and their collaborators, who had avoided unfamiliar places at night. The Jews took advantage of their nightly disappearances to construct new shelters. As mentioned previously, the ghetto turned into a community built on several levels. One was above the ground. Another, the newer one, was below the ground and consisted of a complex network of tunnels and underground bunkers. Ringelblum praised the ingeniousness with which the Jews created such inaccessible, secret accommodations.73 Shelters were also built close to the roofs. These offered opportunities to move from bunker to bunker without being detected. This secrecy meant safety to the Jewish underground, which was eagerly preparing for upcoming confrontations.
Early on the underground sent Jurek Wilner to the Aryan part of Warsaw. Here Wilner had contacted the Polish underground, the AK, and asked them for weapons and special guidance.74 At this point, very few had weapons and no definite plans for action. Some members of the ŻOB were preparing a manifesto.
The ŻOB youths were eager to work in a variety of ghettos. This required constant adjustments to different situations. Because of their extensive travels, they knew the particular methods which the Germans were likely to use, as well as about entries and exits of ghetto hiding places. Every possible move by their enemies was carefully studied. Conspicuously absent from all these underground plans were any considerations of withdrawals. “We do not wish to save our lives,” wrote Wilner. “None of us will come out of this alive. We only want to save the honor of mankind.”75
Wilner viewed any interruption in the Warsaw deportations as a breathing space for those who were left behind. ŻOB’s plans differed from the plans of the Jewish Fighting Organization in Vilna (FPO), which was preparing to escape into the forests, where they intended to fight. In this respect, the Vilna youths resembled
the ŻZW, which also tried to reach the forests. In the case of ŻZW, however, a basic shortage of reliable evidence prevents historians from making clear assessments of their situation.
The first armed confrontation in the Warsaw ghetto was led by Mordechai Anielewicz. His plan was simple. He selected twelve fighters with pistols. They were instructed to join the lines of inmates who were ordered to go to the waiting freight cars, which were supposed to take them to extermination camps. It was prearranged that at a sign from their leader, the fighters would burst out of their places and attack the Nazis and their collaborators. This was a suicide mission. The Jews had pistols, with a limited supply of ammunition. The attackers had semi-automatic rifles with an ample supply of ammunition. Yet, the Jews had a temporary advantage of surprise, which they fully exploited. In no time the Germans recovered from their initial shock and regrouped.
Nevertheless, this first encounter was decisive for several reasons. Hundreds of Jews who stood by recognized that this chaotic situation offered an opportunity to disperse and to disappear. Most of them tried to do just that. In addition to this, also for the first time, the Germans were confronted with a real opposition and were shocked to see Germans being killed by Jews. One Jewish fighter, Hirsch Berlinski, who participated in this confrontation, noted how quickly the Jews were able to disarm several Germans, depriving them of their weapons. He also noted how a number of the SS men were killed and how others were wounded, while other Germans fled, losing their caps and weapons in the process.
The Germans retaliated by setting fire to the building that Anielewicz and his group had occupied. In the end, quite a number of the Jewish fighters reached the safety of a nearby factory.
Another encounter, in a different part of the ghetto, Zamenhof Street, took place between a Jewish group of fighters led by Yitzhak Zuckerman (figure 2.5) and the Germans. In this second encounter the Jewish fighters opened fire only when the German attackers had entered the building, offering a strategic advantage. One of the Jewish fighters was killed. The rest collected the arms abandoned by the retreating enemy and disappeared.
These two major encounters, by the Anielewicz group and the Zuckerman group, were part of the January 18, 1943, Warsaw ghetto uprisings, initiated by Heinrich Himmler’s new commands, which were to destroy the ghetto. “As long as the ghetto exists, it constitutes a nest of revolt and anarchy . . . so the ghetto has to be finished off.” Apparently he was right.76
FIGURE 2.5 Yitzhak Zuckerman was the deputy commander of the Jewish Fighting Organization (ŻOB) and a leader of the Warsaw ghetto uprisings in January and April 1943. (Courtesy Yad Vashem)
The January 18 attacks upon the ghetto were turning points in the existence of the Jewish Fighting Organization. The Germans had anticipated only smooth and easy operations. Now, to their surprise, the Nazis were confronted with an unexpected loss of German lives. The ensuing losses made the Nazis realize that the battlefield was not confined to the front; it existed inside the ghetto. Zuckerman was convinced that this made possible the next ghetto uprising, which took place in April 1943.77 The AK was willing to assist the ghetto fighters by moving them to the forest. The Jews insisted on staying in the ghetto and continuing to fight.78 The AK’s offer was, in part, prompted by the fear that Jewish ghetto fighting could spread to the Polish population in general. The AK had correctly assumed that a premature uprising was dangerous and doomed to failure.
In addition to a few successful skirmishes with the enemy within the ghetto, the Jews sent a message to the general population that confronting the Germans was a real possibility. The crises and frustrations which the fighters had experienced during the big deportations evaporated during these confrontations. Moreover, attitudes toward the Jewish fighters had also changed, both in the ghetto and beyond. Even though these skirmishes were brief, the Germans had to invest a tremendous amount of effort trying to catch the fighters. They only succeeded in catching the sick and feeble ghetto dwellers they happened to come across.
The January Aktion lasted four days. The numbers of German police who had participated amounted to 200. With additional help, the final figure came to about 800. Precise numbers about the losses are elusive; all that was evident were the constant sirens of ambulances. Probably many more Germans and their collaborators were involved than the authorities were willing to admit. All in all, an operation which the Germans had expected to take an hour or two lasted for four days. This in itself was a huge accomplishment for the Jews.
On the outside, Poles were amazed at how effectively the Jews had resisted. Several AK publications began to refer to the Jewish fighters as brave men and women, and congratulated them on how successful their resistance was. It is unquestionable that attitudes toward Jewish fighters changed. These positive appraisals about Jewish resisters helped them significantly in future encounters.
As usual, the ghetto underground took advantage of any lull in hostilities, regrouping and replenishing their weapons and ammunitions. The Germans were also preparing for a final elimination of the Warsaw ghetto. In February 1943, Himmler began to set in motion plans for the ghetto’s complete destruction. His plan was to offer the demolition of the ghetto to the Fuhrer as a present for his birthday. The date of Hitler’s birthday, April 19, happened to coincide with the start of the Jewish Passover.
On April 19, when the German forces reached the Warsaw ghetto, the streets were empty. Most inhabitants were hiding in their bunkers, with entrances sealed and camouflaged.79 Zuckerman explained that “after a few days of fighting, the enemy saw that they could not conquer us easily. With this realization, the Germans attacked by setting fires. These fires spread rapidly, burning some valuable passages between Jewish positions and their possible places of retreat.”80 For the Jews, this spelled the beginning of the end.
The term “military” hardly describes the Jewish forces that confronted the powerful German fighting machine. Almost without exception, the soldiers of the Jewish Fighting Organization and the Jewish Fighting Union were young men and women who had little military training. According to some estimates, there were 750 combatants in battle units, with some 500 in the ranks of the ŻOB and 250 in the ŻZW. ŻOB members carried revolvers of various types. The Jewish fighters had from ten to fifteen rounds of ammunition and four to five hand grenades, mostly homemade. Apparently, the ŻOB had 2,000 homemade Molotov cocktails, ten rifles, and one or two submachine guns, confiscated from the Germans, along with an indeterminate supply of ammunition. ŻOB had also mined the entrances to some key positions in the ghetto area.81
Despite continuous appeals from the Jewish combat organization to the Polish government in London, the Poles had supplied only very limited quantities of arms, and what arms they did provide were in poor shape.82 Moreover, the Polish underground urged its people to engage in an uprising only at the “right moment.” But the “right moment” had to be fixed and decided upon by the moment itself. This meant that the Polish government would attack only when the Germans were vulnerable enough to be pushed back to their border and would not have the resources to retaliate against them.
The Polish authorities had expected the same kinds of reactions from the Jewish underground. But the Jews could not wait for the “right moment.” For them, it was life or death. The Polish government-in-exile and the AK feared that the Jews might indirectly involve them in “a premature, open conflict” with the enemy. The Poles were therefore reluctant to provide the Jews with adequate weapons. This reluctance applied to all Jewish situations in the ghettos, forests, partisans, and concentration camps.
A range of considerations had dominated and complicated the Polish−Jewish wartime relationships. One of these was probably dictated by Polish anti-Semitism. From the Polish perspective the Jews were cowards. Supplying the Jews with proper arms was hardly an option. Attempts to establish more cooperative contacts with the Jews and the AK failed. In contrast, the leftist Gwardia Ludowa not only accepted Jews into their fighting units, but they su
pplied them with weapons and ammunition. Still, the AK and the Polish government in London were better equipped than their leftist Polish counterparts and were in a position to do far more than the GL.
For the duration of the war and throughout Poland, Jewish resistance movements were largely isolated from other resistance groups. In the course of their exposure to persecutions, practically every ghetto had to face their enemy alone. Jewish communities that were prepared to fight were faced with the tragic realization that no one would come to their rescue. On the other hand, in every place where there was even a smallest crack in their walls of isolation, the Jews were ready to stand up to their enemy. This was the case in Warsaw, Bialystok, Krakow, and a range of other communities.83
Indeed, there is evidence as to how gratified Anielewicz was by the initial developments in the Jewish resistance. A part of his letter to Zuckerman, dated April 3, 1943, reads: “I had a feeling of great fulfillment . . . things have surpassed our boldest dreams . . . the Germans ran away from the ghetto twice . . . the dream of my life has come true. I have lived to see a Jewish defense in the ghetto in all its greatness and glory.”84
These successes had depended upon efforts to create new hiding places, as well as complex tunnels and invisible passages.85 One of these sophisticated shelters was at Mila 18, which offered refuge to the ŻOB leaders and many of their fighters. Neither the Germans nor their deadly fires changed the Jewish fighters’ determination to die with what they defined as an honorable death. At Mila 18, most of the fugitives kept their last bullets for themselves, to commit collective suicide when there was no other way out. This is what, indeed, happened.