Underground Movement Helps Jews in Poland by Supplying Them with ” Aryan” Passports

The underground movement in occupied Poland is helping the Jews to escape from the few ghettos that remain by supplying them with ” Aryan” identification documents, it was reported here today by a young Polish Jew who succeeded in reaching Sweden.

A former civil servant in Lwow, capital of Eastern Galicia, the escaped Jew related how the German authorities in that city executed many Jews in the yards of their homes as well as in churchyards, after forcing them to dig their own graves. He estimated that at least 100,000 Jews were massacred by the Germans in Lwow. The slaughter of the Jewish population was carried out chiefly by young soldiers who were permitted to become intoxicated prior to mowing down the Jews with machine guns.

“When I left the Jewish ghetto in Lwow last June, there were only 7,000 Jews left there,” the young fugitive states. “My mother died in May after being held imprisoned by the Nazis for more than a year. My brother died from hunger in a labor camp. My sister was carried from the ghetto to an unknown destination. I succeeded in securing a false ” Aryan” passport and reported to the German labor service. Together with other Polish workers I was sent to Norway to construct fortifications. Norwegian patriots, with whom I succeeded in making contact, took an interest in me and helped me to escape to Sweden. It would be difficult for me to state even the approximate number of Jews who may still be alive in occupied Poland at present, but their number certainly does not exceed more than a fraction of the pre-war total.”