1. Daniel Desiderio
Dr. Marechaux
Independent Study
01/12/2015
The Warsaw Uprising: Means of Resisting Against Oppression
When one reflects on the atrocities committed specifically against those of Jewish faith
by Nazis during the Holocaust, it is almost hard to imagine that there would be any tales of
triumph or heroism, but there would be. A loathsome, irrational attitude towards Jews,
essentially made them the scapegoat for the plight of Germany after World War I. Led by Adolf
Hitler, the Nazis would begin a process to systemically annihilate approximately eleven million
human beings, roughly six million of them being of Jewish background. The Nazi’s used
concentration camps, emphasizing forced labor and later on, camps referred to as extermination
camps, in which their existence was to solely execute as many people as quickly and efficiently
as they could. However, before the Jews were sent to concentration or extermination camps, they
would be ghettoized. The Jewish ghettos, which were set up by the Nazis, forced Jews to live
under abysmal conditions. Segregating the Jews from the rest of the population made the means
of exterminating them easier, as well as making it easier for other civilians to turn a blind eye to
the atrocities the German regime was commanding. The largest and most infamous ghetto was in
the city of Warsaw, located in Poland. It was within the Warsaw Ghetto, where the Jews would
stage their strongest display of resistance against the Germans in 1943. Although the resistance
may not be deemed a success, it sent a message, both to the Nazis and to the rest of the world,
that systematic oppression and senseless violence would not be tolerated.

2. The city of Warsaw, the capital of Poland, stood as the hub of Jewish population and a
beacon of their culture in Europe before World War II. Warsaw's pre-war Jewish population of
more than 350,000 constituted about 30 percent of the city's total population. The Warsaw
Jewish community was the largest in both Poland and Europe, and was the second largest in the
world, second only to New York City.1 It was in 1939, when Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party
wanted to carry out Lebensraum, also known as “living space” for Germans, resulting in the
invasion of Poland. The invasion of Poland in 1939 would have a profound impact on Poland as
a whole, but specifically for Polish Jews. The German’s invasion and quick seizure of Poland in
1939 would also help shape the grim future for Poland’s capital city of Warsaw.
It was from the invasion of Poland and onward when Nazi anti-Semitic sentiment would start
to snowball into effect. Less than a week later, German officials ordered the establishment of a
Jewish council (Judenrat) under the leadership of a Jewish engineer named Adam Czerniaków.
As chairman of the Jewish council, Czerniaków had to administer the soon-to-be established
ghetto and to implement German orders. On November 23, 1939, German civilian occupation
authorities required Warsaw's Jews to identify themselves by wearing white armbands with a
blue Star of David. The German authorities closed Jewish schools, confiscated Jewish-owned
property, and conscripted Jewish men into forced labor and dissolved prewar Jewish
organizations.1
The formation of the Warsaw Ghetto would follow shortly after the German’s systematic
oppression officially came to fruition. The Warsaw Ghetto could be considered the next stop in
the dehumanization process the Nazi’s forced onto the Jewish population of Europe. After being
1 Museum, United States HolocaustMemorial. Warsaw - Holocaust Encyclopedia. June 20,2014.
http://www.ushmm.org/wlc/en/article.php?ModuleId=10005069 (accessed January 13,2015).

3. stripped of their political and economic rights, the Jewish loss of basic human rights would
follow shortly after as they would be forced to relocate to the Warsaw Ghetto. On October 12,
1940, the Germans decreed the establishment of a ghetto in Warsaw. The decree required all
Jewish residents of Warsaw to move into a designated area, which German authorities sealed off
from the rest of the city in November 1940. The ghetto was enclosed by a wall that was over 10
feet high, topped with barbed wire, and closely guarded to prevent movement between the ghetto
and the rest of Warsaw.1 This measure symbolically displayed the Nazi’s blasphemous attitude
towards the Jews, as well as their dehumanization, depicting them as animals that were only
worthy of a cage.
The population of the ghetto, increased by Jews compelled to move in from nearby towns,
was estimated to be over 400,000 Jews. German authorities forced ghetto residents to live in an
area of 1.3 square miles, with an average of 7.2 persons per room.1 Never mind the threat of
losing your life outside of the Warsaw Ghetto in a concentration or extermination camp, danger
loomed inside of the barbed wired fences of the ghetto itself. With said housing deficiencies, it
should come as no surprise that illness and starvation would play a large factor in regards to the
psychological factors leading up to an uprising against the Nazis by those placed in the Warsaw
Ghetto. Between 1940 and mid-1942, 83,000 Jews died of starvation and disease.1 While smaller
numbers of Jews who were forced to live inside of the Warsaw Ghetto were deported to different
camps, it wasn’t until Adolf Hitler decided to liquidate the ghettos, where mass deportations
would begin to take place. From July 22 until September 12, 1942, German SS and police units,
assisted by auxiliaries, carried out mass deportations from the Warsaw ghetto to the Treblinka
1 Museum, United States HolocaustMemorial. Warsaw - Holocaust Encyclopedia. June 20, 2014.
http://www.ushmm.org/wlc/en/article.php?ModuleId=10005069 (accessed January 13,2015).

4. killing center. During this period, the Germans deported about 265,000 Jews from Warsaw to
Treblinka; they killed approximately 35,000 Jews inside the ghetto during the operation.1
It was the Nazi plan to liquidate the Warsaw Ghetto which would inspire the remaining those
70,000 or so Jews remaining in the Warsaw Ghetto to resist their oppressors.
Rachel L. Einwohner, author of “Opportunity, Honor, and Action in the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising
of 1943”, a contribution to the American Journal of Sociology, argues that “collective action in
the Warsaw Ghetto emerged not in response to opportunity but to a lack thereof; in fact, it was
only once the ghetto fighters became aware of the hopelessness of their situation that they began
to plan for resistance.”2 It is important to note that some Jews harnessed a more hopeful outlook
prior to the liquidation, believing that “the Nazis would lose the war and that life would return to
normal”2 However, that optimism would change quickly to desperation as word of what was
taking place to those who were deported to Treblinka and eventually executed was entering the
ears, hearts and minds of those left behind in the Warsaw Ghetto. As hopelessness slowly crept
into their psyche, one could assume that their attitude would change towards a fight for survival,
as they were lacking political opportunity following the dehumanizing policies of the Nazi
regime.
In order to properly resist oppression, organization is crucial. By the end of September 1942,
two organizations emerged that were dedicated to armed resistance: the Jewish Fighting
Organization (Zydowska Organizacja Bojowa), or ZOB, and the Jewish Military Union
(Zydowski Zwiazek Wojskowy), or ZZW. Each formed from the ghetto’s network of activist
1 Museum, United States HolocaustMemorial. Warsaw - Holocaust Encyclopedia. June 20, 2014.
http://www.ushmm.org/wlc/en/article.php?ModuleId=10005069 (accessed January 13,2015).
2 Einwohner, Rachel L. "Opportunity, Honor, and Action in the WarsawGhetto Uprisingof 1943." American Journal
of Sociology, 2003: 650-675.

5. youth.2 The ZOB’s slogan was “All are ready to die as human beings.”3 This is a telling slogan,
as it symbolizes the degrading and dehumanizing way the Nazis were treating the Jews,
specifically in Warsaw, as well as displaying the ZOB’s feeling to take action. Taking action was
a necessary means, as they knew they were probably going to die anyway. The ZOB, led by 23-
year-old Mordecai Anielewicz, issued a proclamation calling for the Jewish people to resist
going to the railroad cars, as their first display of resistance.4
An important component of the Jewish resistance against the Germans was the Jewish
resistors who took part in underground smuggling operations in and out of the Warsaw Ghetto.
The ZBO worked in close contact with the Polish underground movement, which smuggled into
the ghetto area at least a proportion of the arms and supplies used.5 However, in order to
purchase weapons, whether it be legally or in this scenario, on the black market, both require
funds. Both the ZOB and the ZZW decided that the best way to acquire funds for the weapons
needed for an uprising, they would use taxation. ZOB fighter Tuvia Borzykowski wrote in his
memoirs, “Our enforcement bodies were particularly severe towards members of the Jewish
police, whom we taxed extra heavily. The policemen were among the richest Jews in the ghetto
because they appropriated much property left by Jews who fell victim to the German
extermination actions. Many were arrested for not responding to the demands of the tax
collectors; there was even one case when a Jewish policeman was shot when resisting fighters
2 Einwohner, Rachel L. "Opportunity, Honor, and Action in the WarsawGhetto Uprisingof 1943."American Journal
of Sociology, 2003: 650-675.
3 Tiedens, LarissaZ."Optimismand Revolt of the Oppressed: A Comparison of Two Polish Jewish Ghettos of."
Political Psychology,1997:45-69.
4 (Museum, United States HolocaustMemorial.The WarsawGhetto Uprising.
http://www.ushmm.org/outreach/en/article.php?ModuleId=10007745 (accessed January 13,2015).
5 Guardian,Manchester. The Jewish resistancein Warsaw - The Guardian.September 9, 2009.
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2009/sep/09/jewish-uprising-warsaw-ghetto-nazis-holocaust(accessed
January 13, 2015).

6. who came to collect money”2 However, acquiring munitions still did not come easy even after
amassing the funds necessary to purchase them. There was “an absence of military or moral
support from the largely anti-Semitic Polish underground. Except for forty-nine machine guns
the Armia Ludowa (the leftwing, smaller branch of the Polish partisans) grudgingly gave them,
the weapons used in the uprising were nearly all homemade.”6 Despite only acquiring limited
amounts of firearms and explosives and setting up underground bunkers and tunnels, as well as
rooftop passages, the Jewish resistance was ready to stage their full scale uprising.
The first day of full-fledged resistance against the Nazis in the city of Warsaw happened on
January 18th, 1943. “The early morning roundups take the ZOB organization by surprise, and
individuals take to the streets to resist the Germans. Other Jews in the ghetto retreat into prepared
hiding places. The Germans, expecting the expulsions to run smoothly, are surprised by the
resistance. In act of retaliation they massacre 1,000 Jews in the main square on January 21, but
suspend further deportations. The Germans were able to deport or kill 5,000-6,500 Jews.”4
Considering that the Jewish resistance were using mostly homemade weapons and had almost no
military training, one could liken the month long uprising to that of David vs. Goliath. The Nazis
unquestionably had the upper hand in every facet; however this did not demoralize the Jews, as
they understood they would likely die regardless of the outcome. The Nazis showed little mercy
towards the Jews, as they completely destroyed the ghetto over the course of a month. Although
there are only about 50,000 Jews left in the ghetto after the January 1943 deportations, General
Stroop reports after the destruction of the ghetto that 56,065 Jews have been captured; of those
6 Zuckerman, Yitzhak. "A Surplus of Memory: Chronicleof the WarsawGhetto Uprising."World Policy Journal,
1993: 83-87.
4 Museum, United States HolocaustMemorial.The WarsawGhetto Uprising.
http://www.ushmm.org/outreach/en/article.php?ModuleId=10007745 (accessed January 13,2015).

7. 7,000 deported to the Treblinka extermination camp, and the remainder sent to forced-labor
camps and the Majdanek extermination camp. Some of the resistance fighters succeed in
escaping from the ghetto and join partisan groups in the forests around Warsaw.4
The story of the Warsaw Ghetto epitomizes the horror and the dehumanization many Jews
had to endure during the Holocaust, as they were stripped of any rights and deported to forced
labor camps or to be executed. The Warsaw Ghetto’s awful living conditions was still not
enough to coerce the Jewish spirit into becoming one of an aggressor themselves. It wasn’t until
undeniable word that those who were deported from Warsaw were being executed in the
Treblinka Extermination Camp was enough to unite young activists into staging an uprising
against German oppressors. Bleak outlooks and general hopelessness regarding survival pushed
an admirable month long fight, one to symbolize that the human beings the Nazis were treating
like animals, would no longer be afraid to bite back. The Warsaw Ghetto Uprising may not be
deemed a success based solely from a military stand point, as they were using mostly homemade
weapons against a military that was able to conquer most of Europe, however I do not believe
those who staged the uprising thought they would have a chance to succeed either. It wasn’t a
battle to be won or lost; the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising was a collective display of the attitude of
not going down without a fight.
4 Museum, United States HolocaustMemorial.The WarsawGhetto Uprising.
http://www.ushmm.org/outreach/en/article.php?ModuleId=10007745 (accessed January 13,2015).

8. Bibliography
Einwohner,Rachel L."Opportunity,Honor,andActioninthe Warsaw GhettoUprisingof 1943."
American Journalof Sociology,2003: 650-675.
Guardian,Manchester. The Jewish resistancein Warsaw - The Guardian. September9,2009.
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2009/sep/09/jewish-uprising-warsaw-ghetto-nazis-holocaust
(accessedJanuary13, 2015).
Museum,UnitedStatesHolocaustMemorial. TheWarsaw Ghetto Uprising .
http://www.ushmm.org/outreach/en/article.php?ModuleId=10007745 (accessedJanuary13, 2015).
—.Warsaw - HolocaustEncyclopedia. June 20, 2014.
http://www.ushmm.org/wlc/en/article.php?ModuleId=10005069 (accessedJanuary13, 2015).
Tiedens,LarissaZ."OptimismandRevoltof the Oppressed:A Comparisonof TwoPolishJewishGhettos
of."Political Psychology,1997: 45-69.
Zuckerman,Yitzhak."A Surplusof Memory:Chronicle of the Warsaw GhettoUprising." World Policy
Journal,1993: 83-87.