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gay-jewish-bucky · 1 year

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80th Anniversary of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising: "The World Has to Know That We Did Not Go Like Lambs to the Slaughter."

April 19th, 1943 - May 16th, 1943 Warsaw, Poland

“The question is not why all the Jews did not fight, but how so many of them did. Tormented, beaten, starved, where did they find the strength, spiritual and physical, to resist?” – Elie Wiesel

In the morning of April 19th, 1943, on what would be the first night of Passover, the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising began. German troops and SS entered the ghetto to deport its surviving inhabitants to the death camps.

In the summer of 1942, as Jews living in the Warsaw ghetto were deported to Treblinka, reports that made their way back quickly made it clear that "resettlement" meant mass-murder. In response to this, Jews citizens in the ghetto began forming organized resistance forces; the Jewish Combat Organization (ŻOB) and the Jewish Military Union (ŻZW).

Following the January 1943 success of a smaller-scale resistance preventing a deportation attempt, an act that led to the suspension of such deportation efforts by the Nazis, the residents began to secretly build subterranean tunnels and shelters in preparation for a full-scale uprising.

Throughout April rumours swirled of a final deportation of the ghetto's remaining Jews. On the 18th it became clear that German forces, reinforced with artillery and tanks, were moving in to carry out their final action. The alarm was raised, and residents retreated to their underground shelters. They would remain here for the duration of the uprising, refusing to surrender themselves to deportation.

A group of around 700 Jewish resistance fighters, made up of the ŻOB and ŻZW and led by 24-year-old Mordechai Anilevitch, joined together to stage what would be their final stand against the Nazis. These brave young people were malnourished and lacked proper military training, they were equipped with nothing but poor-quality or even homemade weapons and their bare hands.

By contrast German forces numbered 2000, they were well-equipped and well-trained and had advanced knowledge of the existence of these resistance groups.

Despite this stark imbalance, on the first day of the uprising the ragtag Jewish fighters met the invaders head on and successfully forced the Nazis to retreat outside the city walls.

Amongst all of the chaos and destruction all around them, the Jews hiding in the tunnels and bunkers gathered together to celebrate Passover with what little they had, breaking homecooked matzah and drinking illicitly obtained wine.

The Warsaw Ghetto Uprising held strong for a full 27 days, coming to an end on May 16th, 1943. Unable to gain a full advantage, the Germans had resorted to burning the Warsaw Ghetto to the ground in an attempt flush out those in hiding so they could be rounded up.

In the months following the official end of the uprising some Jews remained hiding out in the rubble, periodically attacking German police on patrol.

This was the largest uprising by Jews during World War II and the first significant urban revolt against German occupation in Europe. It inspired many more uprisings, especially amongst Jews in camps and Ghettos.

May Their Memories Be a Revolution

Learn More: Warsaw Ghetto Uprising | Holocaust Encyclopedia Holocaust Survivors Describe the Last Passover in the Warsaw Ghetto Tuesday, Nissan 27, 5783 / April 18, 2023 - Jewish Calendar - On This Day

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thatjewishzionistscout · 2 months

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The fact that so many pro-Palestinians invert, lessen, disrespect Holocaust survivors, and act like the holocaust wasn’t the genocide it was. But when a holocaust survivor speaks out against Israel, suddenly they realize the Holocaust is bad, that survivors deserve respect. But not ones who live in Israel, not ones who support Israel, only ones who fuel their ideology.

Disgusting.

Don’t talk about the Holocaust and its survivors if you’re only going to respect certain ones.

#israel #palestine #antisemitism #israel palestine conflict #jewblr #free palestine #jewish #hamas #left antisemitism #israel gaza #israel genocide #the Holocaust #take there names out of your mouth #i stand with israel

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captain-price-unofficially · 2 months

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A young man sits on an overturned stool next to a burnt body inside the Thekla concentration subcamp outside Leipzig, Germany soon after its liberation by U.S. forces on 18 April 1945

#wwii #the holocaust #april #war crimes #western front #western allied invasion of germany

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gwydionmisha · 1 year

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#Auschwitz-Birkenau #The Holocaust #Queer History #Auschwitz Museum

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toastedbiali · 28 days

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@daughterofstories @freegazafromhamas @inklingm8 @tochecha @jewishgay4il y'all got blocked because our friend here @amphibiousflorence has enough spoons to be antisemitic but not enough spoons to talk about their internalized antisemitism or how this has affected their view of millenia-spanning geopolitical conflicts in an area of the world they've never been to.

Background below the cut:

For those out of the loop, @amphibiousflorence made a new thread to announce they were Out Of Spoons to deal with the concerned Jews in their notes begging OP to reconsider their words...

...including one @freegazafromhamas who is descended from survivors of the Holocaust (as am I), ie a genocide which took place in a "civilized part of the world" where nobody thought such a thing would be possible.

Antisemitism has been a force of nature for 3700 years. We can fight it around the world all we want, we will never root it out everywhere that Jews exist. Just like any other form of bigotry. What we CAN do is provide Jews a safe haven from this force of nature in their ancestral homeland.

Hey @amphibiousflorence, don't use your disability to weasle your way out of the consequences of being a bigot! Unless the Elon Musk club sounds like a fun place to be?

#antisemitism #disability #antizionism is antisemitism #israel #jumblr #ישראל #judaism #face your antisemitism #you can do it #amphibiousflorence #it is hard but it is not ablist to ask someone to tackle their internalized racism even if it is hard to do #holocaust #the holocaust #genocide

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edenfenixblogs · 2 months

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Hello, as a non-Jewish person I have read Night because of your posts. I am not very good at articulating my thoughts, and if anything I say brings up questions for you I will try and answer them. The beginning where there is a sense of hope, is so awful because it just constantly gets worse and worse. The worsening of the regulations while the people of his village tell themselves that it is not too bad, but it is terrible, right from the first limitation, and even before it, all the events that led to it.“German laborers were going to work. They would stop and look at us with no surprise” (100), “And the spectators observed those emancipated creatures ready to kill for a piece of bread”(101). This dehumanization, I wonder how did the German citizens live with it? This sentiment continues on to this day, and yet it is dismissed so easily. “I was sixteen” His relationship with his religion is hurt so much, this general feeling of hopelessness that other people around him also feel, “Just like Rabbi Eliahu’s son, I had not passed the test”. He feels such guilt, he tries so hard to help his father, even as he is starving himself.

While I read this book, sometimes I thought that whatever is happening in this book was not that bad. Sometimes they would get a thicker soup and that would make him happy. How awful is that? For this to be normal for him. For this to not be unusual to me. In the stories of the Holocaust that I have learned, these things are not unfamiliar, the starvation, the apathy of other civilians, the death marches. His story has been categorized in my mind as another set of terrible things that were done to a Jewish person during the Holocaust. His story, every single atrocity that was done to him, I can not imagine properly, yet I only feel an undefinable upset over what happened to him. I think there is something wrong with that? I have very recently discovered that I am, in fact, antisemitic, from your posts and someone else that also realized their antisemitism (which you pointed out), and am trying to outgrow it. I am concerned that my reaction to this book is greatly affected by antisemitism. I can’t tell, am I telling myself that his suffering was ok? Am I? In the book, there are often mentions of Jewish culture that I do not know of. For example, “Shavuot” and the New Year being in summertime. I understand that these are google-able questions, but I was wondering if you have resources for a general introduction into Jewish culture and history? I hope by learning more I can dismantle my antisemitism. If you know a better way to do so, I would appreciate if you could let me know! Thank you for the recommendation to read Night, I will read All But My Life next. I am sorry if my concern over my antisemitism reads as shallow, I do not know how else to express it.

Friend, I am SO PROUD OF YOU and SO GRATEFUL FOR YOU!!!!!

I have said repeatedly that all journeys begin somewhere. More people are antisemitic than are not antisemitic, because that’s how systemic oppression works. You have been taught to hate me.

I thank you for seeing our shared humanity and working to unlearn the harmful things you know.

1. How did the Germans live with the dehumanization? The same way people are living with the dehumanization of Jews now. German antisemitism was deeply tied to antisemitic concepts and tropes that long predated Hitler. These tropes and conspiracy theories had been floating around Europe for a very long time. Furthermore, they have never gone away. All the old tropes and conspiracy theories are resurfacing in the internet age, because the Holocaust only temporarily shamed antisemites, but not enough significant cultural shifts occurred to stop it from rising again.

2. “…sometimes I thought that whatever was happening was not that bad…” I think I see what you are saying. I don’t know your age or where you are from, so I’m not sure if you’ve ever dealt with these kinds of feelings before, let alone how to articulate them — or how to do so in English. But you seem to be horrified by what is happening but you also seem to feel guilt that you find moments of relief in the horrible times as well. I don’t think that makes you a bad person. I just think that makes you a person. The human mind is not built to comprehend trauma on the scale seen during The Holocaust. It instinctively tries to find moments of reprieve that prove things aren’t that bad. And, to be fair, Judaism applauds this. It is a very Jewish idea that we should always look for moments of joy even when our hearts are steeped in misery. Because life is joy. And it is sometimes impossible to wrap our minds around how joyless life can be, and often was for Jews during this time. But your instinct to recognize the impulse to say “well, this day/moment/experience wasn’t so bad” and correct yourself to say, “actually this is a horrific terrible thing that just wasn’t as bad as that other horrific terrible thing that just happened” instead is a good instinct. One of the reasons the Holocaust occurred was because both Jews and non-Jews gave in to this instinct to minimize suffering. Jews minimized our own suffering and clung to hope until it was too late too late to fight back successfully. From the moment we were told to register on lists and wear stars and get on trains, we all should have fought. We should have fought louder and more to condemn Hitler while he was on the rise and to shame those who would vote for him. But ultimately, we were still outnumbered terribly and nothing we did could have stopped the horrors that followed if non-Jews didn’t support us. Non-Jews, of course, bare the true guilt and responsibility for the Holocaust. They refused to question their own hatred. They turned a blind eye to the rising antisemitism. They abandoned their friends in need. They complied with hostile forces who threatened them in order to betray the Jews around them.

Your job as a non-Jew is to never repeat those mistakes. Never let an instance of antisemitism go unremarked on. Ever. And learn what antisemitism looks like. Refuse to ever let it exist or ignored in your presence.

Everyone likes to pretend they would do this, but very few ever do. The reality is that some people hate Jews so much, they will stop being your friend for defending us. And to be a good person, you have to be willing to let those people leave your life if they are unwilling to let go of their hate and learn to do better. The reality is that, at some point, you may very well be asked to choose to reject a friend for the sake of the safety of Jews you have never and will never meet. The good news is that this is not the case the majority of the time!

Most people want to consider themselves good people. And most people want the approval of their peer groups.

Your job is to steer the attitude of your peer group away from antisemitic thinking and toward peace and deconstruction of hateful systemic antisemitism—rather than allowing your peer group to steer you toward the comforting familiarity of Jew-hatred.

3. “…I have recently discovered that I am antisemitic…” I forgive you. As I said, most people are. I draw a distinction between someone who is antisemitic and someone who is an antisemite. You have harmful and negative opinions about Jews because of the systemic bigotry you have been surrounded by your whole life. But this hatred has not become your identity. You recognize this hatred as a part of you that must be discarded. Antisemitism is something you have, not something you are. And you are doing the right things to make sure you stop being antisemitic. This, to me, means you are not an antisemite. If you give up and stop caring about Jews and unlearning these harmful thought patterns, that would make you an antisemite. Because that would mean you are comfortable folding the antisemitism you possess into your identity and sense of self. It seems to me you do not wish to do this. And that means you’re growing and changing for the better. And that is beautiful.

4. “I am concerned that my reaction to this book is affected by antisemitism.” Yeah it probably is. But so is most people’s reaction to this book. That’s the point. Your being willing to confront that is what is important. It is about looking at the places where you lose empathy for Jews, asking yourself why, and then fixing the reason you find.

5. “Am I telling myself his suffering was ok?” I think you’re doing the opposite. I think you’re re-sensitizing yourself to something you were de-sensitized to. That is difficult and admirable.

6. Regarding Jewish culture:

6.a. “Shavuot” is a Jewish holiday. It is the anniversary of the day G-d gave the Torah to the Israelites. In general, a good way to familiarize yourself with stuff like this is to look for resources about Jewish holidays and what they mean. Hebcal offers short summaries of each Jewish holiday that you can import into your phone calendar and learn about as they happen. Wikipedia has a page about Jewish holidays that you can explore. So does the Jewish Virtual Library.

6.b. Jewish culture is vast and impossible to summarize simply. I would recommend starting with the Wikipedia Page on Jewish Culture and exploring whatever seems interesting to you. You’ll never learn it all and that’s ok! I’ve never met a Jew who knows it all either! We have so many subcultures all over the world shaped by unique experiences in diaspora. The most important thing to take away is that no matter how far apart we are or how differently we practice, we are all one people whose goal is to love our fellow humans and do our best to make the world a better place. This is called Tikkun Olam, which means repairing the world. This in itself is a huge concept. But it all relates to making the world better for one another.

I think you are doing a beautiful and amazing thing. And you, by choosing to remove hate from your mind and your actions, are actively making the world a better place. You are repairing some of the damage done by systemic antisemitism.

You are doing Tikkun Olam. And that, in every possible situation, is the best thing you can ever do. Thank you, @JellyMarbles

#goyische support #Tikkun Olam #antisemitism #unlearning antisemitism #deconstruction #deconstructing antisemitism #Holocaust TW #Shoah TW #The Holocaust #elie wiesel #Gerda Weissman Klein #Night #All But My Life

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hanna-lulu · 1 year

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i’ve been comparing the usa now to germany circa the late 1930s and it is not a favorable comparison.

let’s see what we’ve got:

increasing antisemitism

increasing transphobia

increasing ableism

continued oppression of indigenous peoples

laws being introduced to ban gender-affirming care and remove children from their homes if they are allowed to live as they wish

books being banned for having honest and age-appropriate portrayals of race/racism and queerness/homophobia

pushing maid (medical assistance in dying) on people with disabilities and even people who are just poor (this is more in canada but i’m including it here anyway)

a right wing that is seen as ridiculous and absurd, yet is somehow still managing to hold onto power while liberals/leftists laugh it off as if they’ll run out of steam

it’s important to note that in the 1930s, when hitler came to power, the international community thought he was a joke. his overblown rhetoric was silly, his history was laughable, and nobody took him seriously. they thought it would all blow over. also, he wasn’t saying anything that a lot of people didn’t secretly agree with. antisemitism, homophobia, transphobia, ableism, and racism were widespread throughout europe and the usa, and a lot of people had less of a problem with what he was saying and more with how he was saying it. (think kanye west’s antisemitic comments, which joe rogan did attempt to stop him from making so blatantly, but didn’t actually disagree with.)

the first medical and educational facility for gender affirming care was in berlin. did you know that? the institut für sexualwissenschaft (known variably in english as institute of sex research, institute of/for sexology, or institute for the science of sexuality) was founded in 1919 and headed by magnus hirschfeld, who was both gay and jewish. he helped build a library in the institute that was dedicated to the topics of gender, eroticism, and same-sex love. the research undertaken there regarded sexual health of all people, gay, transgender, and intersex, as well as counseling and treatment for alcoholism, gynecological issues, venereal diseases, contraceptives, and more. sexual reassignment surgeries were performed successfully there. the goal was to help those who were suffering because they could not live as who they truly were and to educate the common people, because people fear what they see as different, what they cannot understand.

you won’t find the books in that library today. they were burned as part of the nazis’ campaign of terror and censorship. in 1933, 6 years before world war 2 officially broke out, the institut was broken into and looted by the deutsche studentenschaft (aka the german student union). young adults who had spent their formative years surrounded by hateful rhetoric were accompanied by a brass band as they destroyed this oasis of understanding and knowledge. hirschfeld himself had fled germany years before, as he had been targeted numerous times by nationalists/far right “activists”.

berlin once had a thriving queer community. germany was a home to many jews, my own great-grandparents included. my great-grandmother’s younger brother had a learning disability. their home turned on them out of fear and ignorance, the people told by their leaders that other human beings were not really human, but degenerate filth. my great-grandparents escaped with their lives. many– my great-grandma’s brother included– did not.

the concentration camps that imprisoned and killed so many jewish, queer, and/or disabled people (as well as romani and political prisoners, and japanese-americans IN THE USA) are not consigned to the past. our prison system disenfranchises those who are placed in it and uses them for unpaid labor. refugees are caged for daring to hope that our country– the so-called “land of the free”– would take them in when their homes turned on them. indigenous people are ridiculed and attacked for wanting to help our planet heal and for asking to conserve the land that was stolen from their ancestors. almost a hundred years since the holocaust, and we still haven’t learned.

don’t look away from this. it’s not going to blow over. those who do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it, and we are already experiencing a resurgence of fascist beliefs and rhetoric.

write to your representatives. VOTE. protest if and when you can. show them that we are HERE and we refuse to be written out of the history books, banned or burned away. we are human beings. we live and love and deserve to do so with dignity.

and if appealing to your humanity isn’t enough, remember this poetic version of a quote by german lutheran pastor martin niemöller, an early nazi collaborator and antisemite who later changed his views and opposed hitler’s oppressive regime:

“first they came for the socialists, and i did not speak out–

because i was not a socialist.

then they came for the trade unionists, and i did not speak out–

because i was not a trade unionist.

then they came for the jews, and i did not speak out–

because i was not a jew.

then they came for me– and there was no one left to speak for me.”

there is always another enemy in fascism. anyone who is different will eventually be a target. white supremacy is poison, and fitting the mold of a “perfect citizen” cannot keep you safe. queer infighting and pushing down people who you find “too weird” will not stop the people who hate all of us. to the far right, we are all wrong to our very cores. solidarity in the face of oppression is the only way to survive, live, and thrive.

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jareckiworld · 5 months

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Jan Schüler — Edek. Treblinka (oil on canvas, 2019)

#Jan Schüler #german art #shoah #the holocaust #Treblinka

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zonatcannibalism · 5 months

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if i hear "zionism is the new nazism" one more time im gonna SCREAM.

lets explain something, ok? the pepole saying that do not fucking know what nazism is. 90 precent of goyim do not understand the extent of the horrors our people were put through. You need to realise that every Ashkenazi jew alive today has a story about the way their grandparents escaped. That we grew up hearing stories about the way our people were abused. About the human experimentations. About the starvation. About the way people who could have been us if we were born 80 years ago were treated as less then animals. About how they had their names taken away. About the children slaughtered and the women raped. About the mass graves we were forced to dig for our own people. Its not just 6 milion to us- its humans. Its the children my great grandmother played tag with. This is me keeping out some of the harsher shit i know about the shoa so it would be Tumblr appropriate. This is the CENSORED description.

No matter how bad do you think "the oppressive white supremacist zionists occupation" is, i promise you it is not slightly fucking close to being as bad as what our people went through in the 1940s, and saying it does is just trivialising our pain so it serves your agenda. Its disgusting and dehumanising. Do you realise we still carry the generational trauma of the shoa with us? Do you? You don't get to call anyone a nazi unless they're literally neo nazis. I don't care how awful of a racist bigot they are. You don't get to call someone a nazi until you learn what that word means.

"Punch nazis" is also a trivialisation of the shoa btw. Just dont. Please dont. Yes, i know queer and disabled people were slaughtered by the nazis too. Its still not the fucking same. Every single Jewish person today is haunted by the memory of the shoa. You goyim don't get to turn it into a fucking slogan.

To be clear: this is NOT a post saying Palestinians have a jolly ol time and should stop complaining beacuse the shoa was worst. Its about the way goyim trivialise our trauma.

#jumblr #antisemitism #zionism #ww2 #the Holocaust

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