Jewish Resistence in the Holocaust

Organization of Partizans
Underground and Ghetto Fighters

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About the Project

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Virtual Activities

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Righteous among the Nations

And I never put my pencil down / Alexander Bogen

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Alexander Bogen, born 1916, is a painter, sculptor, and professor of art. Bogen was born in Dorft, Estonia. He lived in Vilna, and in 1943 he escaped the Vilna Ghetto to the forest and became one of the commanders of the Jewish partisan brigade “Nekama” (Revenge). He managed to free groups of Jews from the ghetto and bring them to the woods, and became the commander of a platoon in charge of special missions.

Emmanuel Ringleblum’s "Oneg Ha-Shabbat"

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Emmanuel Ringleblum was a historian who set up an incredible operation to document the difficult days during his time in the Warsaw Ghetto. He gathered a group of people around himself who he recruited to build this unusual archive. He compiled and described every item of information about the daily life of the Ghetto that came into his hands.

ORT schools and professional courses during the Holocaust

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World War II created a new reality of devastation and death on one hand, and brave rescues and preservation of life on the other. With the rise of the Nazis, the World ORT center in Berlin was relocated to the south of France which was not yet occupied by the Nazis at the time, and in 1943 it was relocated again - to Geneva, Switzerland.

Yitgadal Ve Yitkadash – Shalom Asch

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The Jewish resistance during the Holocaust took on many forms. The following piece, based on an essay carrying the same title, by author Shalom Asch, brings the story of Rabbi Ich'eh-Meir Rosenkrantz of Warsaw and his outstanding courage and unbreakable spirit. Ich'eh-Meir didn't give up until the last moment, and remained loyal to his faith even under the subhuman conditions at the forced labor camp.

The Song of the Murdered Jewish People

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The Holocaust lamenter, poet Itzhak Yechiel Katzenelson, was born in 1886 in Kurlichish of the region of Minsk, and was murdered in 1944 in Auschwitz. The poems and plays he wrote aroused the fighting spirit among the ghetto fighters. Many of his poems remain with us to this day, including "The song of the Murdered Jewish People". The ghetto fighters' museum is named after him.

Janusz Korczak – with the children till his last day

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Janusz Korczak was a physician, an author and an educator who ran orphanages in Warsaw. With the closing down of the ghetto at the war’s beginning, Korczak remained committed to the wellbeing of some 200 children who were in his care and did not abandon them until their last moments. His courage is renowned in the chronicles of the Holocaust of European Jews.

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Primo Levi, an Italian Jew, was sent to Auschwitz and releades in January 1945 with the Soviet invasion. After nine months of wandersing, he returned to his home in Italy, where he continued his work as a chemist. He wrote several books about his experiences in Auschwitz in which he describes the processes an inmate underwent in the camp. These books are imbued with a belief in the human spirit. Primo fell to his death on the stairs of his home on April 11th 1987.

Freddy Hirsch – Educator in a concentration and death camp\

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Freddy Hirsch was born in 1916 in Aachen, Germany. At the beginning of 1942 he was sent to Theresienstadt where he was involved in educational activities. In September 1943 Hirsch was moved to Auschwitz where he was one of the founders of the “Family Camps” (a special camp where Jews from Czechoslovakia lived for half a year and then were sent to the gas chambers).

Celebrating Jewish festivals in Auschwitz

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Rabbi Sinai Adler was born in Prague, Czechoslovakia in 1928. When he was 15 years old he and his parents were deported to the Terezin Ghetto, and after 15 months the family was transported to the Auschwitz death camp, where his parents were murdered. Towards the end of the war Adler was transferred to Mauthausen. Here are a few stories from the book by the Rabbi, in which he describes four Jewish holidays as they were celebrated in Auschwitz and Mathausen.

Ada Shaki – The journey that never was, from Greece to Spain

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Rena, the daughter of Ada and Roberto Shaki, tells of her mother’s history during the Holocaust and of the scars that the period left on the entire family. Ada Shaki’s story is one of love, innocence and kindness, and at the same time, one of evil, hatred and unlimited barbarity. Ada died a few years ago in Greece, her homeland. The following is the story of her tragic bravery.

A boxer in the death camp – the story of Victor Perez from Tunisia who became a World Boxing Champion

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This is the fascinating story of Victor “Young” Perez: a Jewish boy born in Tunisia, who dreamed of being a boxer and became the World Flyweight Champion. His life was cruelly cut short in 1945, just before the longed-for liberation, on one of the death marches from the Auschwitz-Birkenau death camp.

A fateful meeting – the story of the Chief Rabbi of Romania, Rabbi Dr. Alexander Shafran

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Alexander Yehuda Shafran was born in 1910 in Bacau, Romania and died in July 2006. He was a theologian and philosopher and served as the head of the Romanian Jewish community from 1940-1948. During the Holocaust he worked tirelessly to save Jews. The following story describes how he confronted the head of the Romanian Church and convinced him to prevent the deportation of many Jews.

David Rabinowitz’s story

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David Rabinowitz’s story is one of the bravery embedded in the noble soul of a young Jewish boy from a Polish village. The story became known to us from his diary which covers five notebooks, in which he reveals his greatest fears, the dreadful living conditions, the changes which a Jewish village child underwent, when suddenly finding himself under Nazi rule.

Songs and dances

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This is the story of the partisan paramedic Chana Shafran, born in Vilna in 1927, who together with her father, was a member of an entertainment troupe which gave pleasure to the fighters in the forests of Belarus. The troupe performed until the area was liberated, and afterwards continued within the ranks of the Red Army, until the end of the war in May 1945.

The Sanctification of G-d’s name – the story of Rabbi Yosef Haim

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This is the special story of Rabbi Yosef Haim of Vilna, Lithuania, as told by his son, the partisan Baruch Shub, who later was to become the Chairman of the Israel Organization of Partisans, Underground Fighters and Ghetto Rebels.

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the project was established by

with the assistance of

Sir Maurice and Lady Irene Hatter | credits

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