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After the
Germans occupied Lublin, the kehillah (the Jewish community
council) was left intact and almost unchanged. Its sphere of
activity was expanded to meet the Germans’ demands and the Jewish
population’s new needs. The kehillah now had to deliver
quotas of people for forced labor; hand over valuables, furniture,
and other household items; cope with economic strictures imposed on
individual Jews and the entire community; and make welfare
arrangements for refugees and the needy—to name only a few
examples. On January 25, 1940, the committee was officially
recomposed as a 24-member Judenrat, although almost no changes in
personnel were made. The Judenrat was headed by Engineer Henryk
Bekker, but his deputy, Mark Alten, was the central personality. The
Judenrat maintained the policies previously pursued by the
committee, but its maneuvering ability diminished as German policy
toward the Jews became tougher.
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