Polish Government circles reported today that the German authorities have prepared a plan for expulsion of at least 2,000,000 Poles and Jews from the Lodz, Kielce and Cracow districts of Poland within four months.
Under the terms of this plan, 600,000 Jews alone will be expelled from the Lodz and Kielce districts, the Polish statement said. The expulsions are now proceeding on a large scale from all towns bordering the line between “German Poland” and the “Government-General,” and Nazi troops are being stationed in the border zone to dig trenches and erect barbed-wire barricades.
The expelled Jews and Poles are transported to other parts of Poland at the rate of several thousand daily, being packed into cattle trains, the Polish statement declared. After riding a number of days, half-starved and shivering with cold, the passengers are then ordered to alight from the trains in the fields and “go wherever your feet will carry you.”
The exiled Polish Government’s statement stressed that Poles and Jews were being treated alike by the Nazis, with all property of those in Lodz, Kielce and Cracow being confiscated. “All commercial, industrial and even artisan enterprises are being confiscated without compensation,” it was stated.
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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.
