50,000 Evicted in Warsaw; Plunder Unabated

Reliable advices reaching here from Nazi Poland said today that 50,000 Warsaw Jews have been evicted from their apartments and told of unabated plundering of Jewish homes and rape of Jewish women by Nazi troops.

The position of the Jews in Nazi Poland, particularly Warsaw, was stated to be growing worse daily. Jews, especially youths, who had previously resigned themselves to waiting are now making every effort to escape anywhere.

The Warsaw ghetto order, under which the city’s entire Jewish population (estimated at 500,000, including 200,000 refugees from the provinces) is condemned to live in two small districts, was issued by the Gestapo without even the consent of the military authorities.

The order climaxed the panic of the Jewish population, which is hastily moving out of the forbidden streets although the Gestapo has not yet issued an official announcement on the subject. Feeling sure that the Gestapo will carry out its decision, the Jews are anxious to avoid the fate of thousands of their co-religionists who have been compelled to leave their homes at half an hour’s notice.

It was learned that the Gestapo had offered to revoke its ghetto decision on condition that the Jewish Community pay the sum of one billion zlotys (about $190,000,000 at pre-war rates), but the offer was spurned since it was realized that, even if such a huge sum could be raised, its payment would not help.

It is estimated that at least 50,000 Jews have been driven out of their apartments in Warsaw by the Nazis. Robbery of Jewish property by the Germans is continuing unchecked. Even the poorest Jewish apartments are being thoroughly plundered, while from Christian homes the Germans are taking only the most luxurious fittings for the use of officers. Gestapo agents are treating Jewish Community officials with the greatest brutality. They wield whips and end every order with the warning: “If it is not fulfilled on time, you will be shot.”

One of the latest developments is the disappearance of Jewish women, who are seized by German soldiers and taken to their camps for lewd purposes. The military authorities at Lodz ordered the Jewish Community to supply 100 Jewish women and when the Community failed to comply, 100 were seized at random in the streets.

While Polish schools are functioning, Jewish schools remain closed as a result of Mayor Starzynski’s official announce that “reopening of Jewish schools is not desired.” Thus, the Jewish schools are limited to feeding children.