More than 700,000 Polish Jews – a third of the entire Jewish population – have been massacred by the Nazis in Poland since last summer, it was charged in a detailed report received here today through underground channels by Samuel Zygelbaum, Jewish member of the Polish National Council.
Thousands of these victims were killed by gas, the report revealed. In the city of Lodz alone 35,000 Jews were executed in gas chambers carried on trucks. 5,000 Jews were exterminated in mobile gas chambers in the towns of Kolo, Bugaj and Isbica.
Describing horrible scenes of the mass-slaughter of Jews in Eastern Galicia, the report states that the pro-Nazi Ukrainian police “cooperated” with the Nazis in rounding up Jews between 14 and 60 years of age. The victims were then assembled in the town squares, or at cemeteries, where they were either machine-gunned or blown up with hand grenades.
No mercy was shown even to women, the report says. Inmates of Jewish hospitals, orphan homes and institutions for aged were summarily shot. In some towns the Jews were told that they were being deported to “unknown destinations,” but were killed as soon as they reached the neighboring woods.
300,000 JEWS EXECUTED IN VILNA AND KAUNAS DISTRICTS SINCE OCTOBER
The report also estimates that 300,000 Jews were massacred by the Nazis in Lithuania and in the Vilna district since last October. It states that 15,000 Jews were murdered in the city of Rowno, Wolhynien, in the course of a pogrom which lasted three days and three nights. The victims included men, women and children. About 6,000 Jews were massacred in the small town of Nancewicze, near Baranowice.
In the city of Lwow, capital of Eastern Galicia, no less than 35,000 Jews were executed, the report estimates. About 15,000 Jews were slaughtered in Stanislawow; 5,000 were killed in Tarnopol; 2,000 were exterminated in Zlochow; 4,000 in Brzelany. Thousands of Jews were also massacred in a number of other Galician towns, including Zborow, Kolomja, Sambor, Stryj, Drohobyvz, Rawa-Ruska, Zbaraz, Przemysl, Kuty, Sniatyn, Stalezczyki, Brody. In many places there were several successive pogroms.
JEWS HIDING IN WOODS AS EXECUTIONS CONTINUE
The entire Jewish population of many small towns in Galicia are still hiding in the woods, since the Nazi executions of Jews continue, the report informs. In order to make the extermination of the Jews more “systematic” the Nazis have introduced a system of marking each Jew in accordance with his possible “usefulness.” The Jews left alive in Lwow have been divided into three categories and marked accordingly. Jews in the first category, classified as “useful working elements,”
The general feeling prevailing among the Jews, the report continues, is that even the people classified in the other categories will gradually be killed. The Nazi authorities cynically state that every Jew in Europe will be exterminated by the Germans five minutes before the war ends, regardless of which side is victorious.
JEWISH COMMUNITIES MUST SUBMIT DAILY QUOTA OF VICTIMS
In many places the Jewish community councils are forced by the Nazis to select daily a number of local Jews for execution, the report states. The victims are then picked up by Gestapo men and by pro-Nazi Ukrainian auxiliary police, and transported on trucks to their death.
In Cracow, fifty Jews were shot on the doorsteps of their homes. In the city of Slonim, 9,000 Jews were massacred. No Jew was left alive in the townships of Zyrowice, Lachowice, Mir, Kolow and other towns in the Slonim district.
25,000 JEWS “DISAPPEAR” FROM LUBLIN; WARSAW JEWS SHOT IN STREETS
Massacres of Jews, though on a smaller scale, are also being carried out in the Warsaw ghetto. Since April, Jewish men and women have been dragged out of their houses in Warsaw and killed by Gestapo agents in the street in broad daylight. The Jews in the ghetto are afraid that nights of terror are in store for them.
Systematic killing of Jews is also going on in Radom and in Tarnow where the Gestapo man are visiting the ghetto daily, dragging men and women out of their homes and shooting them in courtyards or in the street. More than 2,000 Jews were massacred in Lublin in March prior to the deportation of the entire Jewish population from the city. The victims were mostly children from orphanages, patients in the ghetto hospital and inmates of the Jewish homes for aged. About 25,000 Lublin Jews were deported at the same time in a sealed train for an “unknown destination” and no trace of them has been found since, the report says. 3,000 Jews from Lublin are now being held in barracks at Majdanek-Tatarowy, a Lublin suburb.
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.
