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The final
liquidation of the Warsaw Ghetto began on the Eve of Passover, April
19, 1943. The deportation did not come as a surprise. The Germans
had amassed a military force to carry it out, but did not expect to
engage in a confrontation that included street battles. Armed German
forces ringed the ghetto at 3:00 a.m. The unit that entered the
ghetto encountered armed resistance and retreated. The main ghetto,
with its population of 30,000 Jews, was deserted. The Jews could not
be rounded up for the transport; the railroad cars at the
deportation point remained empty.
After
Germans and rebels fought in the streets for three days, the Germans
began to torch the ghetto, street by street, building by building.
The entire ghetto became a sizzling, smoke-swathed conflagration.
Most of the Jews who emerged from their hideouts, including entire
families, were murdered by the Germans on the spot. The ghetto Jews
gradually lost the strength to resist. On April 23, Mordecai
Anielewicz the ZOB commander wrote the following to Yitzhak
Zuckerman, a member of the ZOB command who was stationed on the
"Aryan" side: "I cannot describe the conditions in
which the Jews are living. Only a special few will hold out; all the
others will perish sooner or later. Their fate is sealed. None of
the bunkers where our comrades are hiding has enough air to light a
candle at night.... Be well, my dear, perhaps we shall yet meet. The
dream of my life has risen to become fact. Self - defense in the
ghetto will have been a reality. I have been a witness to the
magnificent, heroic fighting of Jewish men of battle". The
rebels pursued their cause, even though they knew from the outset
that they could not win. Even before the war ended, the Warsaw
Ghetto Uprising became a symbol of Jewish resistance. |
