Righteous gentiles, the Partisans, and Jewish survival in Belorussia, 1941-1944

Holocaust and Genocide Studies

Volumn 11, Issue 3, 1997, Pages 301-329

  Smilovitsky, Leonid ^a  

^a TEL AVIV UNIVERSITY   (Israel)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

EID: 0010880633     PISSN: 87566583     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1093/hgs/11.3.301     Document Type: Review

References (102)

1. Ereignismeldungen, no. 43, 1941
2. Trial of Major War Criminals before the International Military Tribunal, November 14, 1945-October 1, 1946: Official Documents (Nuremberg), v. 38, pp. 279-303
3. Yad Vashem Archives (YVA), file M-41/112, p. 29
4. Nicholas P. Vakar, Belorussia: The Making of a Nation (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1956), p. 156
5. Ivan S. Lubachko, Belorussia Under Soviet Rule, 1917-1957 (Lexington: University of Kentucky Press, 1972), pp. 153-54
6. Trial of the Major War Criminals, v. 4, p. 248
7. Victor H. Bernstein, Final Judgment: The Study of Nuremberg (New York, 1947), p. 198
8. Jan Zaprudnik, Belarus at a Crossroads in History (Boulder, CO: Westview, 1993), p. 97
9. Alexander Dallin, German Rule in Russia, 1941-1945: A Study of Occupation Policies (London: MacMillan, 1957), pp. 205-206
10. Jerzy Turonek, Bialorus pod okupacija niemiecka (Warsaw, 1989), pp. 80-81
11. Testimony of former Supreme Commissar Ostland Heinrich Lohse of 23 October 1947, pp. 202, 294
12. Report of Strauch of 25 July 1943, Vierteljahreshefte für Zeitgeschichte 1 (1956), p. 80
13. National Archive of the Republic of Belarus (NARB), fund (f.) 3500, register (op.) 4, file (d.) 346, p. 19
14. Moshe S. Zhiedovetsky-Rabinovitch, ed., Jewish History and Literature: A Collection of Essays (Rehovot, 1992), v. 2, pt. 2, p. 876
15. Menskaia gazeta, 5 October 1941
16. Belaruskaia gazeta (Minsk), 4 July and 16 August 1942
17. Golas vëski, 29 January 1943
18. Pagonia, 13 April 1944 (these were organs of the Belorussian collaborationists)
19. For more detail see A. K. Solovev, Belorusskaia Tsentral'naia Rada: Sozdanie, deiatel'nost', krakh. (Minsk: Navuka i tekhnika, 1995), p. 178
20. Iurka Vitsbich, Plyve z-pad S'viatoe gary Nëman (Minsk: 1995 [repr. 1956 Munich ed.]), p. 98
21. Iazep Naidziuk and Ivan Kaziak, Belarus' uchora i siannia (Minsk, 1993), p. 414
22. Galina Sergeeva, "Belorusskaia diaspora v gody vtoroi mirovoi voiny," Kontakty i dialogy: Informatsionno-analiticheskii biuleten' (Minsk) (September, 1996), pp. 25-31
23. Iazep Maletskii, "Pod znakom Pogoni," Spadchyna (April, 1996), pp. 164-82
24. Leonid Smilovitsky, "Belarus" in Anti-Semitism Worldwide, 1995/96 (Tel Aviv: Tel Aviv University Press, 1996), pp. 121-23
25. As counted by the author in Niametska-fashystski genatsyd na Belarusi: Sbornik dakumentau i materyialau (Minsk, 1995), pp. 295-323
26. A. Gol'din and E. Iossi, "Nekotorye novye dannye no istorii Kholokosta i evreiskogo soprotivleniia v Belorussii," Vestnik Evreiskogo universiteta v Moskve 2 (9) (1995), p. 120
27. Sovetskaia Belorussiia, 27 June 1996
28. YVA, M-41/151, p. 10
29. YVA, O-32/18 (4). Her eldest daughter (we don't know her name or age) made her way to the Minsk ghetto after the pogrom of 20 November 1943, smuggled her younger brother Vova out, and enrolled him in a children's home. On 19 January 1941 the directress betrayed him to the Germans along with thirty-four other hidden Jewish children. Etta's daughter lived outside the ghetto under an assumed identity, becoming close with a Belorussian boy who subsequently recounted her tale: arrested once under suspicion of hiding arms, the young woman was released for lack of evidence; but someone informed on her, and the Germans took her, torturing and then killing her. The documents do not indicate whether Maizels found her middle child, a boy, after the war
30. Belorusskii gosudarstvennyi arkhiv (BGA), f. 370, op. 1, d. 655, p. 5; f. 409, op. 1, d. 6, pp. 15, 16
31. Sovetskaia Belorussiia, 24 October 1993
32. Author's archive
33. Vitsebski rabochy, 16 March 1994
34. Raisa Chernoglazovaia, ed., Tragediia evreev Belorussii v gody nemetskoi okkupatsii, 1941-1944 gg: Materially i dokumenty (Minsk, 1995), p. 163
35. Author's archive. Letter of Boris Aleinikova from Tolochin, 22 October 1995
36. Sovetskaia Belorussiia, 5 October 1995
37. Jewish History and Literature, p. 869
38. BGA, f. 389 op. 1, d. 4, p. 23; f. 845, op. 1, d. 64, p. 2; f. 370, op. 1, d. 483; p. 15
39. YVA, Collection of the Righteous Among the Nations Department, file 4675
40. Leonid Koval, Kniga spaseniia, pt. 2 (Iurmala, 1993), p. 418
41. Mishpokha (Vitebsk) 1 (1995), pp. 100-102
42. Vladimir Levin and David Meltser, Chernaia kniga s krasnymi stranitsami: Tragediia I geroizm evreev Belorussii (Baltimore, 1996), p. 418
43. Daniil Romanovskii, "Kholokost v Vostochnoi Belorussii i Severo-Zapadnoi Rossii glazami neevreev," Vestnik evreiskogo universiteta v Moskve 2:9 (1995), p. 66
44. Levin and Meltser, p. 247
45. Sovetskaia Belorussiia, 28 January 1994
46. Zaria (Brest), 25 October 1991
47. I. A. Insarov, "Meditsinskie kadry partiszanskikh ob'edinenii Belorussii," Zdravokhranenie Belorussii 7 (1972), pp. 46-49
48. Leonid Smilovitsky, "Minsk Getto: An Issue of the Jewish Resistance," Shvut (Tel Aviv University) 1-2 (17-18) (1995), p. 178
49. BGA, f. 391, op. 1, d. 33; f. 389, op. 1, d. 4, p. 36
50. NARB, f. 1, op. 4, d. 647, p. 5
51. YVA, file o-32/18 (4)
52. Kniga spaseniia, p. 293
53. Mishpokha 2 (1996), p. 70
54. Narysy gistoryi Belarusi (Minsk, 1995), pt. 2, pp. 308-309
55. For more detail see Leonid Smilovitsky, "Antisemitism in the Partisan Movement of Belorussia" (in Hebrew), Yalkut Moreshet 59 (1995), pp. 53-62
56. "In the Heat of the Struggle: Relations of the Jews with the Belorussian Partisans and the AK and NSZ, 1942-1944," Polymia (Minsk) 8 (1996), pp. 194-219
57. Yitzhak Arad, "Response of the Soviet Leadership to the Holocaust" (in Hebrew), Yal Kut Moreshet 62 (1996), pp. 96-110
58. Pravda 29 April 1943
59. Soviet War Documents (Washington, December 1943), p. 73
60. Smilovitsky, "Minsk Ghetto," p. 178
61. Evreiskii mir (USA) 29 (25 October 1996)
62. Izvestiia, 1 March 1995
63. Sefer ha-Partizanim ha-Hahudim, (Tel Aviv: Merchavia, 1958), vol. 1, p. 462
64. YVA, Testimony of Yaakov Segalczyk, 1628/63
65. Testimony of Avraam Klorin, 3185/265-K
66. For more details see Nechama Tee, Defiance: The Bielski Partisans (New York, 1993)
67. NARB, f. 3500, op. 4, d. 272, pp. 38, 41, 44, 49
68. YVA, file M-41/87, pp. 24-27
69. Author's archive. Recording of conversation with Mikhail Iosifovich Sosenskii in Jerusalem, 24 July 1996
70. Yitzhak Arad, "Jewish Family Camps in the Forests" in Rescue Attempts during the Holocaust: Proceedings of the Second Yad Vashem International Historical Conference, April 8-11, 1974 (Jerusalem, 1977), pp. 336-37
71. Stranitsy istorii Kompartii Belorussii: Suzhdeniia, argumenty, fakty (Minsk, 1990), pp. 242-45
72. V. Mikhniuk, ed., Niametska-fashystski genatsyd na Belarusi, 1941-1944 (Minsk, 1995), pp. 359-72
73. Istoriia Belorusskoi SSR (Minsk, 1977), p. 409
74. Tragediia evreev Belorussii, p. 156
75. Koval, pp. 346-47
76. As of 1 January 1941, 10,454,900 people lived in the BSSR; as of July 1995 10,437,400. See Statisticheskii spravochnik sostoianiia narodnogo khoziastva i kul'tury BSSR k nachalu Velikoi Otechestvennoi voiny (Sovet Narodnykh Komissarov BSSR, 1943), p. 25
77. "Belarus," The World Fact Book (Washington, 1995)
78. As calculated by the author on the basis of materials in the archive of the Department of the Righteous among Nations at Yad Vashem as of 1 January 1997
79. Encyclopaedia Judaica (Jerusalem, 1971), v. 13, p. 754
80. The Jewish population of the USSR on the eve of the German invasion had reached almost five million. See Y. Arad, ed., Unichtozhenie evreev Sovetskogo Soiuza v gody nemetskoi okkupatsii 1941-1944 gg: Sbornik dokumentov i materialov (Jerusalem, 1991), p. 60
81. Calculated by the author from materials in the Archive of the Department of "Righteous Among the Nations" of Yad Vashem
82. Rittner and Myers, eds., The Courage to Care: Rescuers of Jews During the Holocaust (New York, 1986)
83. The Book of the Just: The Silent Heroes Who Saved Jews from Hitler (London, 1992)
84. Rescue: The Story of How Gentiles Saved Jews in the Holocaust (New York, 1988)
85. Rescuer: Portraits of Moral Courage in the Holocaust (New York, 1992)
86. They Were Few (New York, 1991)
87. The Path of the Righteous: Gentile Rescuers of Jews During the Holocaust (New York, 1992)
88. Sheltering the Jews: Stories of Holocaust Rescuers (Minneapolis, 1996)
89. "Jewish Units in the Soviet Partisan Movement: Selected Documents," Yad Vashem Studies 23 (1993), pp. 400-23
90. U samoi granitsy (Minsk, 1979)
91. From the letter of the President of the Supreme Soviet of the Republic of Belarus Stanislav Shushkevich to the President of Israel Ezer Weizman, 2 December 1993. Current Archive of the Ministry of International Affairs of Belarus, no. 42-23/515
92. The first trees on the Alley of the Righteous in Minsk were planted to honor Mariia Osipova and her daughter Tamara, Alena Pavlova, Daria Sakuro, Ganna Serova and her daughter Zoia, Ivan and Natalia Shpilenia, Emiliia Varaksa, Tselina Anishkevich and her children Pavel Sivakov, Denis and Nina Galakhov, and Evgeniia Emelianova. Aviv (Minsk) 2 (1996)
93. Aviv 3 (1996)
94. Aviv 1 (1994)
95. Akhdut-Edinstvo (Gomel) 4 (1995)
96. Polatski vesnik (Polotsk), 6 May 1994
97. Aliia (Minsk) 4 (1995)
98. Arkhiv 3 (1996)
99. Mezhdunarodnaia evreiskaia gazeta (Moscow) 13, 14, 15 (1996)
100. "Jewish Culture in Belarus and Its Interpenetration with Belorussian and Other Cultures" (Minsk, May 1994) (abstracts published in Belarussika/Albaruthenica No. 4 [Minsk, 1995])
101. and "The Jews in a Changing World" (Minsk, October 1996) (abstracts to be published in ibid., no. 5)
102. Kontakty i dialogi (Minsk) 11-12 (1996), p. 60