Ukrainian Leaders in Galicia Are Friendly to Jews Despite Nazi Propaganda

Reports reaching here today from Nazi-held Poland reveal that friendly relations are developing between the Ukrainians and the Jews in the parts of Nazi-occupied Galicia where Ukrainians are participating in the local administration.

Despite the efforts of the Nazi occupational authorities to incite the Ukrainians against the Jews, Ukrainian leaders in Galicia are cooperating with the local Jewish leaders with whom they worked for many years under the Polish regime. The Nazi allegations that Jews were responsible for the killing of many Ukrainian nationalists in Lwow when the city was occupied by the Soviet army are having practically no influence on the Ukrainian population.

The majority of the Ukrainian leaders were in Lwow during the Soviet occupation of Eastern Galicia and are therefore in a position to know that the Nazi anti-Jewish allegations are baseless. These leaders are also aware of the fact that a large number of Jews were deported by the Soviet occupational authorities from Lwow and other Galician cities to distant sections of Siberia.

Dwelling at great length on the starvation prevailing among the Jews in Nazi-held Galicia, the report reveals that while the Nazi authorities hardly furnish any food to the Jewish population there, local Ukrainians in charge of the civil administration are displaying great understanding of the Jewish plight and try to alleviate it to any possible extent. Most of the relief for Jews in Galicia, however, comes from the Jews in Poland. Though they trammelled are in great need of food, they share what little they have with their brethren in Galicia through the Jewish communities which have been established in Lwow, Tarnow, Przemysl, Stanislawow, Chertkov, Sambor and Drohobitch.

The report also reveals that thousands of Jews in Galicia are homeless as a result of the “scorched earth” policy of the Russian Army which burned down many buildings when retreating from Galicia. In Lwow all synagogues and Jewish school buildings were not affected by the fires and it is in these buildings that the roofless Jews are given shelter. In Tarnopol, on the other hand, all Jewish public buildings were demolished with the exception of the Jewish Artisans Guild quarters where most of the Jews in the city have been crowded.