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Warsaw Ghetto Uprising

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  • Roza Tzuker (1900 - 1943)
    [ ] Roza Cukier nee Ratzimora was born in Poland in 1900 to Meir. She was a teacher and married. Prior to WWII she lived in Warsaw, Poland. During the war she was in Warsaw, Poland. Roza was murdered...
  • Tzvi Hirsh Tzuker (1892 - 1943)
    [ ] zvi Hirsh Cukier was born in Pulawy, Poland in 1892 to Aharon and Dina. He was a teacher and married to Roza nee Ratzimora. Prior to WWII he lived in Warszawa, Poland. During the war he was in War...
  • Szymon Radzyminski (1905 - 1943)
  • Majer Gurman (1924 - 1943)
    [ ] Mayer Gurman was born in Legionowo, Poland in 1924 to Abraham and Roiza nee Zilbershtein. He was a student and single. Prior to WWII he lived in Warszawa, Poland. During the war he was in Warszawa,...
  • Sabcha Fried (deceased)
    [ ] Sabcha Fried was born to Mendel and Tzirel nee Hofman. Was a child. Prior to WWII lived in Szmulewizna, Poland. During the war was in Szmulewizna, Poland. Sabcha was murdered in the Shoah (accordi...

The Warsaw Ghetto Uprising (Yiddish: אױפֿשטאַנד אין װאַרשעװער געטאָ‎; Polish: powstanie w getcie warszawskim; German: Aufstand im Warschauer Ghetto) was the 1943 act of Jewish resistance in the Warsaw Ghetto in German-occupied Poland during World War II to oppose Nazi Germany's final effort to transport the remaining ghetto population to Majdanek and Treblinka. After the Grossaktion Warsaw of summer 1942, in which more than a quarter of a million Jews were deported from the ghetto to Treblinka and murdered, the remaining Jews began to build bunkers and smuggle weapons and explosives into the ghetto. The left-wing Jewish Combat Organization (ŻOB) and right-wing Jewish Military Union (ŻZW) formed and began to train. However, only the ŻZW received logistical support from the similarly right-leaning Polish Home Army. A small resistance effort to another roundup in January 1943 was partially successful and spurred the Polish groups to support the Jews in earnest.

The uprising started on 19 April when the ghetto refused to surrender to the police commander SS-Brigadeführer Jürgen Stroop, who then ordered the burning of the ghetto, block by block, ending on 16 May. A total of 13,000 Jews died, about half of them burnt alive or suffocated. German casualties were probably less than 150, with Stroop reporting only 16 killed. Nevertheless, it was the largest single revolt by Jews during World War II. The Jews knew that the uprising was doomed and their survival was unlikely. Marek Edelman, the only surviving ŻOB commander, said that the motivation for fighting was "to pick the time and place of our deaths". According to the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, the uprising was "one of the most significant occurrences in the history of the Jewish people".