Persecution of Jews in Przemyśl
The persecution of Jews in Przemyśl by the National Socialist system took place in several waves from 1939 to 1944. This eventually led to the almost complete extermination of the Polish city's Jewish population.
chronology
German occupation
Before the start of the Second World War , about 24,000 Jews lived in Przemyśl , and they were fully integrated into everyday life in Poland.
After the German invasion of Poland on September 7, 1939, the first bombs fell on Przemyśl, which was occupied by German troops on September 14, 1939. Immediately afterwards, the arrest of important Jewish figures in public life began. These included doctors, judges, intellectuals, industrialists and business people. But also politically active Jews or refugees from the West were among them. Due to the Hitler-Stalin Pact and the resulting Soviet occupation of eastern Poland on September 17, 1939 , the Russian troops moved into eastern Poland. They reached Przemyśl on September 26th. The river San flowing through the city became the demarcation line between German and Soviet troops.
Before the city was handed over to the Soviets, German troops killed 600 Jews in the Przemyśl massacre . These were shot in the outskirts of the city and buried in mass graves. This action belonged to the Tannenberg company and was mainly carried out by the 1st Mountain Division . Only 102 executions could be identified.
During the Soviet occupation of Przemyśl between April and May 1940, around 7,000 Jews were deported to the Soviet Union.
In the Zasanie district of Przemysl , which was still occupied by German troops, only a few Jewish residents remained, who were crammed into two houses. In the spring of 1940 a Judenrat was created, headed by Anna Feingold . Armbands with the Star of David were for Jews in Zasanie duty.
First measures
After breaking the Ribbentrop-Molotov Pact , German troops occupied Przemyśl again on June 28, 1941. About 16,500 Jews lived there at that time. Immediately one began to recruit forced laborers among the Jewish population . Registration of the Jewish population was made mandatory. As a countermeasure, the Jews founded a committee to better protect themselves against the reprisals. Ignaz Duldig was the chairman . The Gestapo ordered that the Jewish population in all of Przemyśl must now also wear the Jewish star in order to publicly brand them. At the same time, a Jewish council for Przemyśl was set up under the direction of Ignaz Duldig. Some of the Jewish property had to be surrendered, and Jewish students were forced to clean the streets and collect the garbage. Posters were hung in the streets calling the Jews “vermin” or “lice”.
Deportations
About 5000 Jews from the region were brought to Przemyśl. The first deportations to the Janowska concentration camp took place . 1,000 Jews were deported on June 28, the day the German troops entered. The Gestapo had informed the Judenrat that this number of young people fit for work was needed for work. In return, it was promised that the Jews in Przemyśl would be spared further reprisals. Numerous relatives of the deportees were shot by the SS because the families did not separate quickly enough. Attempts to oppose deportation were punished with death by shooting.
Jews had to give up a large part of their property in the winter of 1941/1942. On December 26, 1941, the police broke into Jewish households and confiscated furs and warming items such as winter boots, coats and fur caps.
The Jews were forbidden to go shopping during the usual market hours. This was only permitted between sunrise and 8 a.m. and after 6 p.m. With corporal punishment, sometimes with the death penalty, disregard of these guidelines was punished.
Establishment of a ghetto
On July 14, 1942, it was announced that a Jewish ghetto would be set up in Przemyśl in the Garbarze district. This area was demarcated from the rest of the city on the same day. The ghetto was now inhabited by 20,000 to 24,000 Jews. On July 26th, forced laborers were recruited again, on the following day 6,500 Jews were deported to the Belzec extermination camp , Ignaz Duldig and his deputy in the Judenrat were shot. On July 31 and August 3, 1942, transports each carrying 3,000 Jews left the city in the direction of Belzec. The transport costs were billed to the Jews. In addition, the remaining Jews were forced to hand over most of their money to the Gestapo.
The ghetto was reduced in size, with the Jews having to pay for the barbed wire that surrounded the camp. At the end of August 1942, 100 Jews were murdered by the Gestapo in Przemyśl. In mid-November 1942, the Jews began to set up hiding places for themselves. The Gestapo issued an order to deport Jews without sufficient working papers, whereby only 5,000 working papers were handed over to the Judenrat. As part of this measure, 8,000 Jews were to be deported on November 18, 1942. However, only around 3,500 people were present at the arranged assembly point. The rest of them went into hiding to avoid the measure. A search by the Gestapo followed, and around 500 Jews were discovered. These were deported to Belzec along with the other 3,500 people.
The ghetto was divided. The Jews needed for work were living in Area A. These were around 1,300 people. Unterscharführer Josef Schwammberger was responsible for this area of the camp. This ghetto area was officially declared a labor camp. The Jews who the Gestapo considered unfit for work lived in Area B.
Dissolution of the ghetto
In 1943 the ghetto was dissolved. On September 23, 1943, 3,500 Jews were deported from Area B to Auschwitz. In addition, the deportation was carried out of 600 Jews from the area A . These were the in the Province Subcarpathian located village Szebnie after Auschwitz deported.
There was no significant resistance to the measures in the ghetto. Only one escape attempt by twelve men is recorded. Eleven of them were shot while trying to escape, and the twelfth was caught and publicly executed.
At the beginning of September 1943, 1,580 Jews trusted the Gestapo's promise to be deported to a labor camp and surrendered. After handing over their valuables and clothing, they were shot in groups of fifty people in the courtyard of the Judenrat on September 11, 1943. This so-called gym event took place around 200 meters from the city center.
The Gestapo tracked down Jews who were hiding and rounded them up. On September 11, 1943, she shot 1,000 people on the outskirts of Przemyśl. On September 28, 1943, another 100 Jews were brought from the region to the city, but they were immediately deported to Auschwitz. The last 1,500 Jews in the ghetto were brought to Auschwitz via Stalowa Wola in southern Poland at the end of February 1944 .
The ghetto was destroyed at the end of February 1944. The last 27 Jews discovered were tracked down and shot in May 1944. The family who kept her in hiding were also executed. In the course of the following months, an additional 100 Jews living in hiding were tracked down and murdered by the SS. Only 300 of the Jews originally living in Przemyśl survived.
On July 27, 1944, the city was taken by the approaching Soviet troops.
Rescue attempts by Albert Battel
Oberleutnant Albert Battel , adjutant of the local military commander of the Major Liedtke region , tried to save the part of the Jews who did forced labor for the Wehrmacht - so-called Wehrmacht Jews - from deportation. His application to the Gestapo to leave this group in Przemyśl was rejected. In response, Battel had the Wehrmacht block the bridge over the San against the SS. The bridge was the entrance to the ghetto. In this way he initially prevented a deportation planned by the SS. He managed to get around 240 Jews to safety with two trucks before the SS entered the ghetto. Later he had about 500 inmates of the ghetto transferred to a barracks; in their cellars they escaped deportation to extermination camps. For his deeds he was included in the list of the Righteous Among the Nations in Germany .
See also
literature
- Przemyśl , in: Guy Miron (Ed.): The Yad Vashem encyclopedia of the ghettos during the Holocaust . Jerusalem: Yad Vashem, 2009 ISBN 978-965-308-345-5 , pp. 617-620.
Web links
- September 1939, A synagogue burning in Przemysl, Poland
- Przemysl Ghetto
- Przemysl Memorial Book (Translation of the 1964 Israel published in Hebrew Sefer Przemysl ( Memorial Book of Przemysl ), a 547-page account of the history of Jews in Przemysl, written by Holocaust survivors from Przemysl. In the fifth part of the Holocaust is treated.)