Rejoicing at Jewish Deaths a Myth Cyprys

A Jump for Life: A Survivor’s Journal from Nazi Occupied Poland, by Ruth Altbeker Cyprys. 1997

The “Poles Rejoiced at Jewish Deaths” Myth: Clarification of the Much-Misrepresented “Jews Are Getting Burned Like Bugs” Remark During the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising

Originally written in 1946, Cyprys’ account is remarkably free of the biases that are nowadays so common in Holocaust literature.

THE HOLOCAUST AND THE POLOKAUST WENT HAND IN HAND

Cyprys devotes almost as much attention to German crimes against Poles as to those against Jews. Furthermore, Cyprys makes it clear that the Germans regarded the Poles as having no more inherent right to live than the Jews. Consider what happened when two ethnic Poles were mistakenly herded with Jews into a Treblinka-bound train: “Two gentiles in our wagon tried to explain to the Germans that they did not fit into this society and tried to show their documents. All to no avail. ‘Even if you are not a Jew, you are a damned Pole’, yelled the German, and slapped the older woman’s face, barking ‘Polish swine’ and with his rifle butt drove her to the wagon.” (p. 95).

ANTISEMITISM NO BARRIER TO POLES AIDING JEWS

Cyprys reported a balanced range of Polish attitudes towards Jews (pp. 118-119, 127, 132), some of which varied within the same family (pp. 142-143). Ironically, she was helped by the obsessively anti-Semitic Mrs. Zosia, who felt sorry for the Jews and who aided them (pp. 220-221).

THE PLUNDER OF JEWISH PROPERTY BY JEWS AS WELL AS BY POLES

In his FEAR, Jan Tomasz Gross presents a distorted view of Poles acquiring Jewish properties during the German occupation. In contrast, when mentioning how some Poles pretended to be VOLKSDEUTSCHE in order to join in the German-sponsored pillage of Jewish properties, she nevertheless added: “The local mob usually guided the Germans to the rich Jewish houses and stores. With the deepest shame I must admit that there were some Jews among the scum.” (pp. 25-26).

THE “DOOMED JEWS SEE GLEEFUL POLES” MYTH

The author and her daughter were loaded on a Treblinka-bound train. It was only with the greatest difficulty that Cyprys was boosted up and enabled to cut through the bars to jump out and to have her daughter Eva (Ewa) get pushed out.

One inflammatory Polonophobic Holocaust myth is the one about Jews, while being transported to the death camps and with full knowledge of their impending deaths, being forced to endure the sight of indifferent or rejoicing Polish onlookers. [This meme is reinforced, for example, by the scene in Steven Spielberg’s SCHINDLER’S LIST, in which a Polish girl gives a sarcastic “Good e, Jews!” to soon-to-be-deported Jews.]

Against such nonsense, we learn that the death trains had small, barred windows well above eye level, and with nothing to stand on in order to look out of them (p. 96). Viewing (in either direction) was nearly impossible. Consequently, very few Jews, packed as they were in the trains, were even in a position to look outside.

WARSAW GHETTO UPRISING: POLISH REMARKS IN PROPER CONTEXT

The oft-quoted Polish remark about Jews in the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising “getting burned like bugs”, although invariably presented as such, wasn’t necessarily derogatory. After all, Poles used the same phrase to refer to themselves in the face of their defenselessness against German incendiary bombing during the Warsaw Uprising! (p. 200).

POLISH COLLABORATION DRIVEN BY GERMAN PRESSURE

The Germans strongly promoted alcoholism among Poles. This was done in order to degrade them (Rafal Lemkin, in his classic that introduced the term genocide, elaborated on this). Pointedly, the Germans also exploited this dependency as leverage in the denunciation of fugitive Jews (p. 174).

Cyprys elaborates on the semi-collaborationist Polish Blue Police (POLICJA GRANATOWA): “There were policemen who would accept neither bribes nor ransoms but, for the sake of their ideology, would hand over the Jews. Looking at this group objectively, however, one has to say that among their ranks there were many VOLKSDEUTSCH volunteers. The activities of the Polish police aroused such hostility among the majority of the Polish people, that death sentences were passed on several policemen by the Polish underground organizations and executions were carried out by Polish lads…upon the orders of the Organization a detailed list of all policemen was kept in the Underground offices. These contained, apart from proved misconduct, evidence of their standard of living which ascertained whether a dark blue was profiteering from blackmail or extortion. These lists of evidence were kept till the Warsaw Uprising: I do not know whether they survived the insurrection.” (p. 138).

However, by no stretch of the imagination was the Polish Blue Police the main force in the roundups of Jews for their deaths: “On about 5 August [1942] all ‘workshop territories’ were hermetically closed and the Germans and Ukrainians started a ruthless expulsion of anyone found outside these areas—always with the efficient help of the Jewish militia. Wherever a German or a Ukrainian did not venture the militia men would gladly fish out as many as possible of those still hidden in cellars and vaults, only to oblige the Germans.” (p. 52).

Most Polish blackmailers (szmalcowniki), “the scum of mankind” (p. 119), took only part of the belongings of their Jewish victims and didn’t usually actually denounce Jews to the Germans (pp. 119-120). They sometimes excused their conduct by their poverty and even gave the Jews advice on how better to disguise their Jewishness (p. 140).

THE ROLE OF JEWISH COLLABORATORS

Underworld Poles weren’t the only ones that fugitive Jews feared: “The Jewish Gestapo men who remained alive were very dangerous. Their eyes were penetrating and Jews pointed out by them were lost beyond hope.” (p. 165). Cyprys personally observed them shouting Jewish slogans or singing Jewish songs in order to provoke a telltale reaction in fugitive Jews among the pedestrians (pp. 165-166).

POLISH ASSISTANCE TO JEWS, AND POLISH UNDERGROUND RESISTANCE

Cyprys alludes to Zegota as follows: “It goes without saying that only a fraction of the Jews in hiding knew about the existence of this committee. Those who were in touch with the patriotic ‘Polish intelligentsia’ or people who worked in the Underground were most likely to benefit. Everything was obviously carried out in the greatest secrecy, using all available means of security.” (p. 150). Complaints about Zegota aiding only a modest number of Jews are clearly off the mark.

In fact, Cyprys has a very sage understanding of ALL underground activities: “In reality underground activities were extremely stressful and required a great deal of steadiness and concentration. And because it had gone on for so many years, it was exhausting even to the strongest individuals and led to many casualties.” (p. 184).

Cyprys provides a level of detail about the Poles’ 1944 Warsaw Uprising usually only done by Polish authors. We read, for instance, about the devastating effects of the German nebelwerfer (“roaring cow” or “cupboard”), and the systematic destruction of Warsaw by Germans AFTER the Uprising.