page_title: Mordechai Anielewicz
section_title: Warsaw Ghetto uprising
hierarchical_section_title: Mordechai Anielewicz / Biography / Fleeing the Ghetto / Warsaw Ghetto uprising
caption_attribution_description: English: A painting of Mordechai Anielewicz and his girlfriend Mira Fuchrer in the ruined Warsaw ghetto. Čeština: Kresba zachycující Mordechaje Anielewicze a jeho přítelkyni Miru Fuchrer v popředí ruin varšavského ghetta.
context_page_description: Mordechai Anielewicz was the leader of the Jewish Fighting Organization, which led the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising; the largest Jewish insurrection during the Second World War, which inspired further rebellions in both ghettos and extermination camps. His character was engraved as a symbol of courage and sacrifice, and to this day his image represents Jewish resistance during the Holocaust.
context_section_description: In October 1942, the Jewish Marine Corps managed to establish contact with the Polish Home Army, which was able to smuggle a small amount of weapons and explosives into the ghetto. Since the end of September 1942, the Jews started building fortified bunkers and shelters in the Warsaw Ghetto, and there were 600 by January 1943. Each fighter had a gun and several hand grenades (many of them home-made) or Molotov cocktails. There was however a lack of ammunition and heavier weapons – only a few rifles, ground mines, and one machine gun were available.
  On January 18, 1943, the Germans resumed deportation. Anielewicz, together with other members of ŻOB and ŻZW, decided to act. Twelve of them joined a group of evacuated Jews, and attacked the German soldiers on the contracted signal. In the subsequent confusion, part of the deported Jews managed to escape. Most of the resistance in the attack died. Anielewicz, who commanded the operation, managed to escape. This first case of armed resistance was of great importance. Among other things, it led to the greater willingness of the Polish underground to provide weapons to the Jewish resistance. Not all weapons, however, came from underground groups. Some of them ŻOB bought from arms dealers. The beginning of the revolt was a prelude to the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising that began on April 19. During these three months, Anielewicz's leadership underwent intensive preparations for further clash with the Germans. He decided to use the guerrilla way of fighting with a vast network of tunnels, bunkers, roofs and surprise moments. He believed that enough Jews could withstand the ghetto for months. A day after the Germans suspended deportations, he wrote an open letter to the people of the ghetto on the name of the Jewish Battle Organization:
  To the Jewish Masses in the Ghetto 
  On January 22, 1943, six months will have passed since the deportations from Warsaw began. We all remember well the days of terror during which 300,000 of our brothers and sisters were cruelly put to death in the death camp of Treblinka. Six months have passed of life in constant fear of death, not knowing what the next day may bring. We have received information from all sides about the destruction of the Jews in the Government-General, in Germany, in the occupied territories. When we listen to this bitter news we wait for our own hour to come, every day and every moment. Today we must understand that the Nazi murderers have let us live only because they want to make use of our capacity to work to our last drop of blood and sweat, to our last breath. We are slaves, and when slaves are no longer profitable, they are killed. Everyone among us must understand that, and everyone among us must remember it always.
  The final destruction of the ghetto and deportation of the remaining Jews began on April 19, at 6 AM, the day before Adolf Hitler's birthday and Passover. SS functionary Ferdinand von Sammern-Frankenegg sent 850 soldiers (German and Ukrainian) to Warsaw with sixteen officers who accompanied a light tank and two armored cars. Members of Jewish resistance groups attacked groups of German soldiers with pistols, grenades, and Molotov cocktails from roofs, balconies, windows, doors and adjoining courtyards. Although the Germans had military superiority, they were not prepared whatsoever for the guerrilla way of fighting they had encountered. On the contrary, Jews had a perfect knowledge of the environment, relied on a number of hiding places, and were difficult to target because of the interconnection of individual houses. After two hours of intense fighting, the Germans withdrew. 
  At 11:00 the next morning, soldiers under the command of SS General Jürgen Stroop entered the ghetto, where again they encountered hard resistance from approximately 750 Jewish defenders. Stroop set up artillery and sent soldiers to look for the hiding Jews. In the afternoon of the same day, there was a symbolic event where two Jewish boys climbed to the roof of one of the houses where they put Polish and Jewish flags. Both of them were in the 
caption: Anielewicz and girlfriend Mira Fuchrer in the destroyed Warsaw Ghetto (a painting by Shimon Garmize)
exif: {}