The chief rail artery through which the Germans were supplying hard pressed Nazi troops in the Ukraine was cut 11 times between last April and August by a band of Jewish partisans operating in an undisclosed section of Poland, the Polish Government reported today. Many carloads of vital war materials were destroyed when military trains were derailed.
At the same time, the Polish Telegraphic Agency here reported that the entire Jewish population of the city of Pinsk, which is menaced by the Russian forces advancing through the Pripet Marshes, has been massacred by the Germans together with Jewish inhabitants of surrounding villages. There were more than 30,000 Jews living in Pinsk before the outbreak of the war. Since the German occupation of the city, thousands of Jews had been sent from Pinsk to forced labor in the Pripet Marshes.
The Jewish guerrillas, who are composed of representatives of various political factions, issued the following manifesto: “We have started activities on our own account, although we are in no doubt as to the outcome of our fight – we know it is hopeless but we want the world to know that we are determined to dis with arms in our hands. We hope that our sacrifice will find an echo in world opinion.”
The Jewish partisans do not confine their activities to sabotaging rail transportation, but also attack German patrols, bomb German cafes and have demolished the machinery in a large dairy and performed acts of sabotage in several factories and labor camps, the report says, adding that it is not possible to disclose the exact regions where the group operates nor the names of those who have fallen.
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The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
