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PARTICIPATION OF JEWS IN THE GUERILLA (PARTISAN) MOVEMENT IN UKRAINE DURING WWII​

​By Alexander Kruglov, PhD
    This article was written for TKF in conjunction with SAMU Atlas project
     English translation by Vera Moshkevich

 ​On the territory of Ukraine, several thousand Jews fought against the Nazis in partisan detachments and underground organizations.
In 1946, a member of the Commission of the Academy of Sciences of the Ukrainian SSR Bobyshkin O.K. prepared statistical data on the personnel of the Soviet partisans in Ukraine [1]. According to this data, among 98.5 thousand partisans of Ukraine whose nationality was established [2], there were 1,078 Jews (1.2% of the total number of partisans). Analysis of this statistics shows its discrepancy with the actual state of affairs. According to the lists of the personnel of the 2nd Vinnitsa partisan brigade, it consisted of 217 Jews but according to Bobyshkin's certificate - 53. The Rovno partisan formation consisted of 308 Jews, but according to Bobyshkin's certificate - 102. The certificate does not include Jews who were a part of the number of the large partisan formations of Ukraine. For example, the Jews (111 people) who were part of the partisan detachment of Nikolai Konischuk operating in Volyn, are not counted.

According to S. Yelisavetsky's estimates, over 900 Jews [3] fought in five partisan detachments alone on the territory of Western Volhynia and according to S. Spector's estimates, there were from 1700 to 1900 Jews in the 12 partisan detachments of Western Volyn [4] . According to the database of the Central State Archives of Public Associations of Ukraine (TSGAOO of Ukraine), there were 2,230 Jews among 85 thousand partisans in Ukraine. To this number should be added more than 400 Jewish partisans whose names were listed among the personnel of the Soviet partisan formations in Ukraine but were not reflected in the database of the Central State Autonomous Educational Organization of Ukraine. Similarly there were about 200 Jewish partisans of the special purpose brigade A. Brinsky, 10 Jewish partisans of the D. Medvedev "Winners" and up to 80 Jewish partisans who were members of several independent partisan groups on the territory of the Carpathian region. Thus, 2929 Jewish partisans ​[5] are known by name.
​It is necessary to mention specifically Partisan detachments and groups that almost entirely consisted of Jews. They arose in the summer of 1942 in Volyn, in Eastern Galicia and on the territory of the Vinnitsa region. Jewish partisan groups were created by those Jews who fled from ghettos and camps while escaping destruction by the Nazis. Many of the organizers of the Jewish detachments had previously been members of underground organizations in the ghettos.

​One of the main goals that the Jewish partisans set for themselves was the salvation of the remnants of the Jewish population. Family camps were often set up near partisan bases in which fugitives from the ghettos, including women, the elderly and children, found refuge.         
In Volhynia, from summer to December 1942, there were about 1000 Jewish partisans who were part of the 30-40 independent groups. Many of them joined the Soviet partisan formations at a later time. For example, a detachment under the command of Mikhail Gendelman ("Uncle Misha") entered A. Saburov's unit [6].         
A number of Jewish partisan groups (the most famous of them - "Sofiyivka" and "Kolki") operated in Eastern Galicia. Some of them joined the compound of S. Kovpak during his raid in the Carpathians in the summer of 1943 [7].
​In total, over 1.500 people fought as part of Jewish partisan detachments and groups in Ukraine.

The central headquarters of the partisan movement “ЦШПД” did not give direct instructions to the commanders of the partisan detachments to help Jews - those who were in the ghetto and those who were hiding in the forests, being in the family camps or with combat partisan detachments. However, individual partisan commanders often rescued Jews on their own initiative. Thus, the partisan detachment of Jozef Sobesyak operating in Volhynia saved several hundred Jews who fled from the ghetto. One of the partisan detachments of the Vinnitsa region freed Jews from a labor camp in the village of Mikhailovka. The partisan unit of S. Kovpak during the raid in the Carpathians freed over 300 Jews from the camp in Skalat on 8/7/1943. In the partisan brigade of A.P. Brinsky, on 12/17/1942, about 500 Jews[8] found shelter in three family camps. On the other hand, there were partisan commanders who refused to accept Jews into their units and even ordered to shoot them under the pretext of fighting spies. The “ЦШПД” leadership, with obvious delay and at the local level, reacted to such decisions but it would be wrong to say that it secretly “patronized” such actions.          

  At the same time, the absence of the relevant directives for Assistance to Jews from the “ЦШПД” untied the hands of those partisan commanders who were infected with anti-Semitism. This usually happened in those detachments where there was no proper military discipline. It even went as far as killing Jews on ethnic grounds. If such actions were punished immediately by the partisan commanders (up to the public execution of anti-Semites by hanging), they were no longer repeated. Thus a special department of the 2nd partisan brigade (Vinnitsa region) sentenced the commander of one of the detachments to be shot for arbitrary execution of partisans and robbery of civilians. At the same time, the verdict stated that "being an inveterate anti-Semite, he openly expressed these sentiments in the regiment", threatened to expel all Jewish partisans and also stated that he would "shoot with two machine guns" all the Jews hiding in the forest [9] if they did not leave forests . The deputy commander of another partisan detachment was sentenced to 10 years after the war for expelling 18 Jews from the detachment and personally shooting another one; on his order, two Jewish girls were also shot "for having ties with the Germans" [10]. However  such harsh punishment of anti-Semitic commanders was used extremely rarely during the war and immediately after it.        

It cannot be argued that anti-Semitic manifestations in partisan units were widespread. They probably took place only in separate partisan formations. In the conditions of a joint struggle with the enemy, military skill and personal qualities of people apparently came to the fore which held back the growth of anti-Semitism. In most cases such behavior was clearly discouraged by the higher command. At the same time it should be noted that there was virtually no proper instructive work against the background of the nationalist and anti-Semitic propaganda of the occupiers in the partisan detachments, which created the atmosphere for the manifestation of casual anti-Semitism among the partisans.

There is evidence that Jews fought not only in Soviet partisan units but also in units of the “Ukrainian Insurgent Army” (UPA), created by the “Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists” (OUN) to fight the USSR, Germany and Poland in order to create an independent Ukrainian the state. However, in those few cases when the Jews really turned out to be fighters of the UPA units, they most likely either got there by mistake - mistaking nationalists for Soviet partisans, and then their combat biography turned out to be short, or they carefully concealed their Jewishness. There is evidence of two units of the UPA who took under their patronage the Jewish family camps in the forests (the units of Babiy and the Polishchuk brothers) but they were the exception, not the rule. Usually, when an UPA unit met a Jewish armed group or a family camp in the forest, Jews were killed as communists or even without any pretext. There is also a number of testimonies about Jewish doctors and other specialists who were forcibly taken by the UPA units with them since it was very rare to find Ukrainians as medical personnel; usually, when the Red Army approached, they were shot [11].

​Sources
1. Central State Archives of the Supreme Bodies of Power and Administration of Ukraine (TsGAVO of Ukraine), f. 4620, op. 3, d.102
2. According to the Ukrainian headquarters of the partisan movement, 220 thousand partisans were operating on the territory of Ukraine.
3. The Catastrophe and Resistance of Ukrainian Jewry (1941-1944). Essays on the history of the Holocaust and Resistance in Ukraine. Part II. Resistance. Kiev 1999 .-- S. 319
4. Spector Sh. The Holocaust of Volhynian Jews. 1941-1944. Jerusalem 1990, p. 322-323
5. The Catastrophe and Resistance of Ukrainian Jewry (1941-1944). Essays on the history of the Holocaust and Resistance in Ukraine. Part II. Resistance. Kiev 1999 .-- S. 320-321
6.    Spector Sh. The Holocaust of Volhynian Jews, 1941-1944. Yad Vashem: Jerusalem: Federation of Volhynian Jews 1990, p. 289-290
7.     A Brief Jewish Encyclopedia. - T. 8. - Stb. 442
8. Altman I. Victims of Hate. Holocaust in the USSR 1941-1945 The Ark Foundation. Collection "Top Secret". Moscow, 2002 .-- P. 400
9.    GARF, f. 8131, op. 31, d. 16308, l. 63-67
10. Central State Archives of Public Associations of Ukraine (TsGAOO of Ukraine), f. 1, op. 23, d.974, l. 65-66
11.    Pohl D. Nationalsozialistische Judenverfolgung in Ostgalizien 1941 - 1944. Organization und Durchführung eines staatlichen Massenverbrechens. 2. Auflage. München: R. Oldenbourg Verlag 1997, S. 375

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