The chapter discusses different ways Jewish people resisted Nazi oppression during the Holocaust. It notes that while armed resistance had little military impact, many Jews resisted through maintaining their dignity and humanity even in dire circumstances. Two examples are given: a boy who refused to eat like an animal in the ghetto, and a girl who secretly attended lessons at her former school while forced to work there. The chapter also describes the 1943 Warsaw Ghetto Uprising where 1,000 fighters held off the Germans for 27 days, showing the Jewish spirit could not be defeated.

1. THE JEWISH SPIRIT
By Ivan Gonzalez

2. Chapter 6 Summary
 In the eyes of many people they have asked
themselves why did the Jews not fight back,
“The Idea that no Jewish people ever fought
back against Nazi control is a myth”, they in
fact did fight back but sadly in reality it had a
very small effect on German tyranny.

3. Continued…
 The Jewish people are a peaceful and
optimistic people at the time some had hope
that nothing bad would happen or that there
torment would end quickly.

4. Continued…
 The Jewish people fought back with military
force, escaping and joining rebel groups,
resistance in concentration camps, but most
importantly and more successfully with the
“Jewish Spirit”.

5. Continued…
 In the German ghettos people were degraded
and treated like animals by being beaten,
killed, and Insufficiently fed. But the Jews still
resisted in the ghettos, in the death camps,
and in their hearts, they resisted. Their lives
had been stolen from them, but the Nazis
could not steal their hope.

6. Continued…
 One example of “The Jewish Spirit” is a young
boy at the time named Roman Halter who
lived thought his hardships to tell the story
this time in his life.
 Roman and his friends would go through the
sewers in the ghetto and go into the city to
beg for any food even with the danger of
being beaten or killed looming over them.

7. Continued…
 When Most people got their food they would
wolf it down like animals but one day roman saw
an elderly couple get their plates and shit down
and chat like if nothing was wrong in the world,
roman asked them why they acted like that and
they responded with ”if you lose your self-dignity
you are lost. Then you really become what they
want you to become”. Roman then realized that
even if they are killed, beaten, or underfed if you
still act like the person you are you are not truly
oppressed at least in small way.

8. Continued…
 Another example is of Alicia Appleman. Alicia like many
other children was forced to work. The Germans believed
that education should not be wasted on Jews and forced
them to work instead.
 Alicia was forced to clean furniture and polish silver, she
worked there and very quickly realized that the shop she
was in was actually owed by her father, her father had been
murdered by German officials because he was successful,
smart, well educated man, then she was forced to clean the
floor at her old school where she was mentally tormented,
she loved to learn and she loved school and there she was
in her old school but she wasn’t allowed learn or have any
contact with the people there.

9. Continued…
 All this just continuously proves how evil the
Nazi regime was. When she was done she
would walk in her old school and pretended
to be a student, this gave her hope and briefly
made her more optimistic. Sometimes she
would climb a tree and listen to her old
teacher give lectures this was her only time
where she would feel more at peace like if she
was a normal girl again.

10. Continued…
 Many people escaped and would send thing to keep their
children preoccupied, some teachers would teach in
secrecy, some would even dance and act joyful in the
streets. These were small ways of resistance, the non
violent ones.
 However there were some cases of armed resistance like in
1943 in Warsaw in Poland where the Germans “cleaned” out
the ghettos there were about 70,000 Jews left and out of
them 1,000 were “ghetto fighters”. There they carefully
planned there revolt. In 27 days there fought back with
grenades, home made bombs, and sniper like tactics. In the
end they were defeated but there message was clear, “the
Jewish spirit will always live on” and this event defiantly
shook the German empire.

11. Continued…
 However there were some cases of armed
resistance like in 1943 in Warsaw in Poland where
the Germans “cleaned” out the ghettos there
were about 70,000 Jews left and out of them
1,000 were “ghetto fighters”. There they
carefully planned there revolt. In 27 days there
fought back with grenades, home made bombs,
and sniper like tactics. In the end they were
defeated but there message was clear, “the
Jewish spirit will always live on” and this event
defiantly shook the German empire.

12. Work Cited
 Thomas, Mark. "Chapter 6 Pg.61-72." The
Deadliest War: the Story of World War II. West
Berlin, NJ: Townsend, 2011. Print.
 "Jewish Resistance under Nazi Rule."
Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia. Web. 25 Oct.
2011.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jewish_resistan
ce_under_Nazi_rule>.