Resistance (9 page)

In all, the decade of the 1930s was a period of dire poverty and widespread unemployment throughout Poland, but the greatest burden was placed on the Jews employed in the more vulnerable sectors of the economy who received less aid from the government, which proved incapable of dealing with the economic situation. From the middle of the 1930s, evidence of the increasing influence of the anti-Jewish course in the economy found its extreme and clear expression in the policies of the radical right opposition, which did not refrain from resorting to violent persecution and riots. At the same time, the ruling Pilsudski camp adopted anti-Jewish measures in the political and economic spheres by means of the "legitimization" process of an anti-Jewish boycott. When asked about his policy toward the Jews, the prime minister, General Felicjan Slawoj-Skladkowski, replied that he rejected violent means but that economic sanctions were mandatory. Economic sanctions directed against a sector of the population whose faith, language, and customs differed from those of the majority were deemed appropriate. About a quarter of all the Jewish inhabitants of the city were paupers in need of help, and some of them were on the verge of actual starvation.

The structure of Jewish society was that of a pyramid: at the top were a few of the wealthy. The middle layer consisted of most of the middle class, while the wide base contained the greatest number of people, those with low incomes or lacking steady incomes. In the course of time, these proportions changed, according to sociologist Jacob Lestchinsky. The top and middle layers of the pyramid thinned out, while the lowest layer of the pyramid swelled out of all proportion. During the entire interwar period, the Jews felt the need to reorient their professional lives and move from petty commerce and middleman positions to industry and established occupations. They sensed that a move in the economic status of the Jews would improve their image in the eyes of the gentiles. During the thirties, work in industry was regarded as a guarantee of stability and the promise of decent working conditions. There were innumerable petitions and attempts by Jewish public bodies to direct the many Jews without a livelihood to Jewish factory owners, but these had only limited results. Jewish factory owners were unwilling to employ Jews for several reasons. The enterprises owned by non-Jews employed only a few Jews as a rule, and hence the presence of a large number of Jews in a single factory was an unmistakable indication that the owner was a Jew—a matter the owner preferred to conceal. Second, most of the Jewish workers did not want to work on the Sabbath, which was then the Jewish family's accepted day of rest, even among the more secular circles. It was natural for an enterprise that employed large numbers of workers to keep Sunday as the compulsory day of rest, and exceptions to this rule caused discomfort and confusion in the production process. In certain industries, the non-Jewish workers themselves objected to the employment of Jews. At any rate, the acute distress as well as the antisemitic mood evidently moved some of the Jewish industrialists to take on a number of Jewish workers despite the drawbacks involved.

The Polish government took an active role in directing the economy. Nearly a quarter of the capital, and ownership of some basic industries, was in government hands. The nationalization of entire branches of industry, such as salt, tobacco, alcohol, and lotteries, excluded Jews from areas in which they had formerly played a considerable role. Jews also claimed that credit policies discriminated against them. Jews were almost entirely barred from working in the national and municipal administrations. In his book
The History of the Jews in Warsaw,
Abraham Levinson indicated that

 

in 1931, there were half-a-million administrative workers in the Polish government, with one percent of Jews among them—less than a tenth of the Jewish sector all together. In 1923, among the 3,177 clerks employed in national credit institutions—a sphere of the economy in which Jews were noted for their experience and native talent—there were 23 Jews or .66%. The Jews comprised 33% of Warsaw's population, yet among the 4,341 workers and officials in the municipal tramway services, two Jews, or .05%, were employed in 1928. Fifteen hundred additional workers and clerks were taken on in 1929, and after many efforts another... 4 Jews.

 

In an increasingly dire situation, the aid and advice given by the Jewish institutions concerned with mutual guarantees played a significant role. In addition to the professional unions organized according to their economic activities and employment, there were also funds for loans and urgent assistance within the Jewish communal framework. The Organization for Rehabilitation through Training (ORT) and the Society for the Promotion of Vocational and Agricultural Work among the Jews prepared Jewish youth for working as artisans and craftsmen and helped by providing the machinery and training for workshop personnel.

There were also attempts to direct young people toward agricultural training. The Hehalutz movement, made up of older members of youth movements who were trained to join the kibbutz movement in Palestine, and other pioneers, who wished to be part of a communal effort before emigrating, worked on agricultural farms and did other types of work in anticipation of their future in Palestine. While some youth groups were no more than reserves for a political party, such Zionist youth movements as Hashomer Hatzaír, the Young Zionist, or Akiva had defined ideologies but were not linked to a political party. Their members, especially in the pioneering movements that prepared their members for life in Palestine, refrained from public and political activities in the Diaspora and focused on preparation for
aliyah,
the ascent to the land.

The Jewish community of Warsaw maintained an educational network that also stressed vocational training. The most efficient and popular of the organizations was the group of companies offering loans without interest to the needy—a form of assistance that combined the ancient tradition of mutual guarantees with the Torah's dictum of not lending money on interest. The Central Organization of Societies for the Support of Non-Interest Credit and Promotion of Productive Work (CEKABE), which became known for its organizational and practical achievements, was set up with the financial assistance of the Joint in
1926.
Immediately after World War I, the Joint was drawn into helping Jewish communities that had suffered from the havoc wrought by war, and later on it returned in order to stand by the Jews of Poland in their growing economic distress. The basic concept guiding the Joint's assistance was one of constructive rehabilitation—that is, not philanthropic aid for daily needs, but money that would enable the recipients to rebuild or strengthen their source of livelihood or to undergo professional retraining. In the circumstances prevailing at the time, this form of help was a protective measure for the Polish Jews. Those who received money were obliged to return it in small specified amounts, while the fund network was organized on the basis of membership and membership fees. In the course of time, the Polish Jews' share in the fund began to grow. Marcus writes that in 1937, CEKABE, which gave loans without interest, numbered 825 local companies, with a dues-paying membership of 100,000.

The historian and chronicler of the Holocaust Emanuel Ringelblum, who was employed by the Joint in Poland, wrote a biographical study of Yitzhak Giterman, one of the heads of the Joint in Poland and one of the driving forces behind the concept and organization of the fund network. (Giterman was murdered by the Nazis in January 1943, more than a year before the murder of Ringelblum himself.) Giterman maintained that there should be less charity but that the money at the disposal of the funds should serve as a stimulus to the economy. According to Ringelblum, the funds were a popular institution on the Jewish scene which had a role in every Jewish community and even in those towns where a community had barely established itself. The cooperative movement's activities among the Jews were also significant, in part because the movement abandoned the conservative inclinations ingrained in the Polish-Jewish mentality. It proved itself on many occasions by the effective means it adopted to counteract distress.

Among the different welfare institutions; such as old-age homes, hospitals, and so forth, the Association for the Care of Jewish Orphans (CENTOS) occupied the most respected position. It supported orphanages, among them the famous orphanage run by the pedagogue and writer Dr. Janusz Korczak and his assistant, Stefania Wilczynska, who not only created a model home for children but introduced original educational methods and self-instruction to both Jewish and Polish children which were studied by other educators. Korczak, Wilczynska, and the directors of other orphanages in Warsaw did not abandon their charges and in the days of the Holocaust Korczak's last journey, with two hunderd children on board the train to Treblinka in the summer of 1942, served as a beacon of dignity amid the appalling darkness of barbarity and slaughter.

The TOZ society was responsible for health and child care. The Central Agency for Aid to Jews in Warsaw saw to the most urgent needs of the poor and in 1936 gave assistance to some three thousand families. And perhaps the most original form of help came from a group of volunteers who made the rounds of the Jewish courtyards with large baskets in hand, asking for foodstuffs for the patients in hospitals. This group was called "Good Sabbath, Little Jews" after the greeting with which they heralded their request for food for the sick. Children in these quarters excitedly awaited their arrival, carrying small packages containing food and sweets.

Youth movements played a primary role in the Jewish struggle and defensive action that was the last vivid manifestation of the Warsaw Jews' will to live. The youth movements, which treated adolescence and youth as an estimable period rather than simply as a transition to adulthood, originated in Germany at the onset of the twentieth century. According to Walter Laqueur's book on German youth movements, most members were middle-class young people who felt alienated and sought to change the social fabric. Within the intimate setting of the youth movements, they tried to improve the social climate.

While rudiments of the Jewish youth movements of Poland were evident prior to World War 1, consolidation and maturity took place between the wars. The youth movements provided an ideology to those yearning for a purpose and for an intimate attachment to ease the dreariness of their lives. While it is not known how many belonged to the youth movements of Poland, sixty thousand is a reasonable estimate. During the occupation and the time of the ghetto, this reservoir of young people focused on local affairs and activities within the Jewish community.

Historians may ponder what might have been the fate of Polish Jewry had the Germans not invaded Poland in 1939 and not imposed the "final solution." What we can ascertain is that the two decades between the wars were a time not only of hardship and trial for the Jews, but also of achievements. And after all, the difficulties of relations with non-Jews were at least conflicts with a human dimension; the war and the Nazi occupation wrought a transition from an era of human troubles to one of inhumanity and destruction.

I
N THE AFTERMATH
of the German invasion in 1939, Poland was divided into three areas. Western Poland was annexed by Germany and incorporated into the Reich. Eastern Poland was annexed by the Soviet Union as part of the Ribbentrop-Molotov Pact between Germany and the Soviet Union established just on the eve of the German invasion. Central Poland was established as the General Government under German occupation, with Cracow as its capital. Still, Warsaw remained the center of Polish and Jewish life.

Within the occupied area, Nazi rulers issued a seemingly endless series of decrees affecting both Jews and Poles. Incremental in nature, these set the framework for ever-intensifying oppression. The interval following each new decree allowed the captive population to adapt to deteriorating conditions. After each momentous decree was issued, such as the confiscation of Jewish property, imposed forced labor, or the transfer of Jews to work camps, the Jews breathed a sigh of relief. The worst seemed to be over and no greater trouble appeared likely. Few could envision the future.

The mood of the Jewish community was somber. After the first few weeks of occupation, the Jews of Warsaw were fed up with the daily decrees and injunctions. Perhaps it would be easier, they said to one another, if Jews were told what was permitted and could then assume that everything else was forbidden.

At the outset of the occupation, the Nazis employed deceptive tactics. Military commanders of the Wehrmacht, which governed the city, mollified the community. Jews were told that "they need not be worried about their well-being." In October 1939 Hans Frank, a German attorney and top-ranking Nazi, was appointed governor-general of central Poland. He announced that "under a just government, everyone would earn his living by working. On the other hand, there is no room for political agitators, money-dealers and Jewish exploiters under German rule." Frank's remarks were ambiguous. No one was certain whether he would target only larcenous Jews or all.

On November 13, 1939, a Nazi decree was issued requiring that all Jews wear a white ribbon imprinted with a blue Star of David on the sleeve of their outer clothing. Jewish-owned shops also had to display Jewish identification. Three weeks later, on December n, Jews were forbidden to change their places of residence within the area under the supervision of the governor-general. Within days, it was announced that Jews were obliged to register all their property and possessions, and on January 26, 1940, Jews were forbidden to use the railways without special permission.

The segregation and isolation of the Jews continued. Next, they were barred from various professions and excluded from entering restaurants, bars, and public parks. Jews were to use special carriages on public trams. A 7:00
P.M.
curfew was imposed on the entire population in September 1940. For Jews, the curfew began an hour or two earlier.