Pacification of the Warsaw Ghetto

On 17th April 1943 German troops started the liquidation of the Jewish District of Warsaw, known as the Warsaw Ghetto. However, their plan to run it smoothly had to change as the SS units met resistance shown by a group of 1000-1500 insurgents who decided to die in an armed battle rather than being executed.

The Uprising in the Warsaw Ghetto was the first organised armed resistance in urban environment on a 'mass' scale during World War II. Therefore, Warsaw is known all across the Globe as the city of two risings against Nazi German occupants: The Uprising in the Ghetto of 1943 and the Warsaw Rising of 1944.

Image source: Internet

In April 1943 about 60,000 Jews were still residing inside the ghetto, a small portion of 460,000 who were enclosed there since the closing of the gates of the ghetto in 1940. The majority had already been deported to the Treblinka death camp (mass deportations during Aktion Reinhard in summer 1942) or fallen victim to starvation or diseases.

As for the Uprising in the Warsaw Ghetto, according to Jurgen Stroop's report, 2054 german soldiers were involved in the operation (SS, Wehrmacht and Police) and "of the total of 56,065 Jews caught, about 7,000 were exterminated within the former Ghetto in the course of the large-scale action, and 6,929 by transporting them to Treblinka, which means 14,000 Jews were exterminated altogether. Beyond the number of 56,065 Jews an estimated number of 5,000 to 6,000 were killed by explosions or in fires. The number of destroyed dug-outs amounts to 631."

Jorgen Stroop. The posture tells the whole story...

Image source: Stroop's Report, May 1943.

Stroop underlines in his report also measures taken to stop any help from the Aryan side: "during the large-scale operation the Aryan population was informed by posters that it was strictly forbidden to enter the former Jewish Ghetto and that anybody caught within the former Ghetto without valid pass would be shot. At the same time these posters informed the Aryan population again that the death penalty would be imposed on anybody who intentionally gave refuge to a Jew, especially lodged, supported, or concealed a Jew outside the Jewish residential area."

Image: A stamp released for the 70th Anniversary 

of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising

Two organisations are known as far as military resistance is concerned, namely Żydowska Organizacja Bojowa (ŻOB, Eng. Jewish Combat Organisation) with 600 fighters and Żydowski Związek Wojskowy (ŻWZ, Eng. Jewish Military Union) with 400 fighters. The Jewish leaders of the Uprising were Mordechaj Anielewicz, Marek Edelman, Paweł Frenkel, Eliezer Geller, Leon Rodal, Dawid Wdowiński.

Jews expelled from their hide-outs/dug-outs.

Image source: Stroop report, May 1943

Read more:

• http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/the-stroop-report-may-1943 accessed on 19 April 2018
• Kazimierz Moczarski: "Conversations with an Executioner", 1981  ("Rozmowy z Katem", 1977)

The book is an unbelieveable but true story of a Polish officer, Kazimierz Moczarski, who was imprisoned by Communist regime and kept in the same cell with Jorgen Stroop, the SS commander of the liquidation of the Ghetto in Warsaw.

The story tells us also a terrible truth about the stalinist era in after-war Poland, when Polish soldiers fighting the German regime during WWII were accused and persecuted in THE SAME WAY as the Germans who were the REAL CRIMINALS OF WAR.