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Only a few people of the shtetl somehow were able to escape the fate of the others. They wound up in Russia because of the retreat of the Red Army in Luniniets. They bear witness to relate how they lived through and saw with their own eyes the sorrow of the catastrophe as it really took place.

When war broke out in 1939, the Red Army took over the town and there was an immediate decline in the lives of the jews, who were hearing dire rumors which became reality. Depression and fear of death took over. The Soviets had immediately imposed edicts banning all political parties and organizations in the town. Of course, support for Israel was stopped. This moderate control lasted to June 22, 1941, when Hitler launched the attack on Russia.

That same day, the radio announced that the whole country was in a state of war, and German planes appeared in the skies of Luniniets. The alarm and confusion among the Jews is indescribable.

Most Jews of the town decided not to move. The thought of a general annihilation never even entered their minds. Yet a considerable number of young Jews – about 1,000 – tried to get to the Russian border to escape. There they were caught by the Red Army and returned. Only a few were successful in roundabout ways (through forests and swamps) in crossing the borderline of Russia, and were saved.

Thus it was decreed that the entire shtetl would remain in the hands of the murderers. In the beginning of July 1941, the Germans captured the town. On August 18^th, they enlisted all males from age 12 to forced labor beyond their strength and the next day all were killed. On the 18th of August, only a few shoemakers and tailors remained from the first annihilation. In a sandy area of the town, all the women and children were gathered in a barb-wired fenced area under the strict watchful eyes of the Germans and were shot. According to one woman who was successful in remaining alive from her wounds in the pit, we know the details of the suffering of these women and children in the ghetto during a whole year, August 1941 – September 1942. Hunger, epidemics, brutality of young children under the eyes of their mother was a daily occurrence. On the day of Elul (holiday), total murder was put into effect – the remnants of the mothers, sons and daughters, and dear grandparents. They were transported to a huge death pit that was dug next to the town near the eyes of all the Christian inhabitants, who used to live with the Jews in peace and quiet for so many years.

Many of the Christians were ashamed of the Jewish plunder that took place – the destruction, the desecration. For another three years the town was in the hands of Hitler. After that, it was taken over by the Red Army. Remnants of the Jews that remained alive in Russian – about 25 people returning – still saw for themselves the shtetl of death, and found the large pit where their loved ones had been thrown into. They decided to fence in the holy gravesite. They worked together for six weeks in this sacred task, in memory of their lost relatives and friends, until they completed the fence. Thus they separated from the defiled earth – our blood was a testament to what took place.

Revulsion and defilement that our eyes had seen were with us as our eyes carried us to our land of Israel.

The rest are names from the shtetl – outstanding people who were victims.

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The Jewish population of the shtetl Luniniets awaited the Nazis with broken hearts and mournful depression. The news by radio that Hitler attacked Russia without a declaration of war terrified all the residents of the town, especially the Jews, who already knew what to expect of him. Anguish and dread seized the population.

The loud hammering and thunderous crashing from corner to corner caused bitter lamentation and questioning from person to person as what should be done. What to do? A portion of the young population courageously decided to escape – some by wagon and some by foot – in the direction of Micashevits, Russia. The escape was not easy. The first ones in line to try were the government employees and their families because they were able to use wagons, but only some, not only the young, were successful in getting space on a wagon. Yet a number of them were lucky enough to reach the old Russian-Polish border, where there occurred an event painful beyond belief to describe. The border was closed by order of the Russian army. There was no other choice as to what to do, they were forced to return to Luniniets or Kazanhorodok. A few escaped and broke through somehow.

Many of the discouraged young people remained together with their parents and were killed with them eventually. There was no escape, no refuge, and the dispirited Jews awaited their fate. Then came rumors from captured Poland that the situation was not yet hopeless, that not all Jews were being targeted to be killed. They were prepared for a catastrophe, a pogrom perhaps, but surely not for complete annihilation. With the entrance of Germany and its assault on the city it was clearly otherwise. Their hatred of the Jews was rearing its head, though the fear of mass killings and plunder was unthought of.

Then came the first command of the conqueror. Every Jew must attach a patch with a yellow circle of seven centimeters and a Star of David on the front and back shoulder of his coat, and is forbidden to be seen on the sidewalks. The Jews gave up walking on the streets at all, as some of them had been shot without any reason. Three days later more commands were ordered and Jews were in the hands of the controllers, being played with like in a ballgame. Decrees were given by the command, such as making Jews gather their money, gold, warm clothes and various other needs the invaders could use.

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Joy That Did Not Last Long

With great joy, the Jews of the town welcomed the Red Army instead of Hitler's troops whose entry they had expected and feared at the start of the war. But when the Soviet authorities began to eliminate not only the Zionist parties but also public and cultural institutions such as the “TAZ” company, the private banking cooperatives (Private and Merchants'), as well as the Hebrew “Tarbut” school, the “Tel-Chai” library and the like, the mood changed completely, and instead of joy, sadness surfaced. In particular, the depression increased after the imprisonments, the emissaries' probings and the night-time interrogations by the secret police (NKVD – The People's Commissariat for Internal Affairs) no one knew who had been interrogated the night before because they were forced to swear not to speak about it – and who was in the queue to be next the following night.

Of the first who had been imprisoned by the Bolsheviks were Dr. Axelrod, his wife Lisa Hofshtein and their son, Shlomo Kaplanski and his family; they were sent to Eastern Kazakhstan. After that, imprisoned were: Dovid Litman and Boruch Gratzolin, Velvel Maron, Feivel Dichter, Yaakov Musikant and Yaakov Bauman. And they didn't skip me. Many times I was “invited” to a night-time interrogation by the NKVD where they demanded I inform them of my activities, especially about my Zionist activities. They showed me many photos of the party's activities. They revealed a great interest in my visits to Eretz-Yisrael (Palestine) and accused me of aiding immigrations to Palestine, thereby proving my attitude towards English imperialism, because the new immigrants, they stated, justified the British mandate in Palestine. Furthermore, they claimed, the youth organizations and the Hebrew Zionists and the “Hechalutz” movements serve orddinary Poles who are interested in expanding the Zionist movement and its culture, helping prevent these circles from joining the Communist movement.

“But for the important economic role you fill'” – they told me (I conducted my activities at the time in the Luninyets forests and the surrounds), – “We would by now have “fixed” you, but the road to repentance is open to you, and if you prove yourself in the political arena as well as you do in the economic area – then things will go well for you.” And they continued, “You know, of course, what we mean…” and, because I didn't respond to their advice – they freed me, but not for long!

My heart predicted and knew what was to come. Two days before Hitler invaded Russia, on the 20^th of June, 1941, the KGB appeared – “The People's Commissariat for State Security,” announcing that I am under arrest. My mother, brother and sister were to be sent to “who knows where.” The time to settle affairs was very short. In the meantime they started to search the house, looking for arms. After their search we were pushed onto a truck and brought to a train on which, under police guard, were all those who were to be sent away. I was led further, under heavy guard, to the building of the NKVD secret police on Sodowa Street, opposite the Pravoslavi Cemetery.

[Page 71]

After carefully searching me they took my wristwatch, a fountain pen and many simple personal items. The prison in the basement, a room of 3 x 3 meters, held 12 people. Among the prisoners was Nechemia Hofshtein. Those to be sent away, in addition to my family, were the Hofshtein, Gratzolin and Eisenberg families, Yaakov Gloiberman and Meyer-Leib Zmudiak. In the prison, Nehemiah Hofshtein was the most frightened by the threat of imprisonment: purely out of fear he had had no food for two days.

When new prisoners arrived they brought us, the “veterans,” news of the war between Hitler and Russia. To the Poles who were imprisoned with us, this was happy news, but to us, the Jews, this shocking news aroused grave concerns and fears for the fate of our people in Hitler's occupied territory.

On the evening of the second day, they called me to the interrogation room to inform me that because of my counter-revolutionary Zionist activities I was accused of violating Section 58 of the Soviet Penal Code and was to remain in prison until a Court date. I signed the document and was returned to the cell.

On the fourth day, the 25^th of June, towards morning, we were taken out of the basement and transferred via a truck to a train. As I passed Sodowah Street I saw Gedalyahu Tzipkin standing by his house, and Golda Slutsky, who was sweeping the street. Those were my last impressions of Luninyets.

At the train station we were transferred to two sealed freight cars and attached to a train of 30 carriages in which were about 1300 prisoners from the Pinsk prison.

On the way we passed trains laden with soldiers, woundeds and refugees. In the last group were hundreds of Luninyets Jews who had fled to avoid Hitler's troops who were chasing the retreating Soviet army. Near the former Soviet border, near Mikashevitchy and Lenin, the border guards returned the Luninyets refugees – except for the few who'd managed to cross the border and were saved. Most returned to Luninyets but later perished at the hands of the Germans. In contrast, those who successfully crossed the former Soviet border wound up being sent to remote areas in Russia that were far from the front.

After two days of travel, we reached Yeletz in the Orlov region. There we were separated into cells. Among the prisoners, I encountered acquaintances from Luninyets, Lenin, Pinsk and Dovydhorodok. Two of them were Yaakov Boiman and Asher Golub from Lenin. The latter gave me a shirt, handkerchief, soap and a bread bag. From Yaakov Neuman, I got a few pieces of sugar…

“Normal” prison life began. Before we entered our cells we washed in a bathroom, and were given various injections. They rolled in the notorious “Container” (a large barrel for certain biological needs). For food, we got 400 grams of bread each day, warm water serving as tea, thin, watery soup and occasionally millet porridge. For “airing” we were taken outside once a day for 10 minutes in the yard, under heavy guard. There were 3 Jews in the cell: Me, Nechemia Hofshtein and Yisroel Buch, a Jew from Warsaw.

We “sat” for five weeks in Yeletz and then our upheavals started again. The rapid advances of Hitler's armies forced the authorities to move us further and further away, into the depths of Russia. This journey took 15 days in sealed cargo cars, under heavy guard, in terrible conditions. Because of their panic due to the war they often forgot to give us food, sometimes for days on end. There were 45 or 50 people in our car; but only two Jews, me and Nechemia Hofshtein. Our food this time was salted herring and water –

[Page 72]

water from the barrel of salted herring that was in our cargo car. It was no surprise that some died during the journey…

I remember that one of those who died in the other train car was Bronchik, the teacher at the “Tarbut” school in Dovidhorodk. In our car, two Polish gentiles died, and a pair of new boots, a large fur coat of theirs had caused the prisoners to argue violently over them, and they came to blows. The fight was settled by the Soviet authorities that accompanied us.

We arrived in the city of Kirov accompanied by hundreds of NKVD agents. They immediately led about 2,000 prisoners from the cars and led them about 6 kilometers from the train station to the big prison in Kirov, which housed about 15 thousand permanent prisoners. This prison also had a well-known reputation: In the days of the Czars it was the central gathering place for those to be sent to Siberia; from there the revolutionaries and freedom fighters were brought to distant places near the Siberian borders. After the revolution, this prison remained, still serving the same function of this “holy” mission…

The Kirov population, apparently accustomed to these sights, watched the parade of tired, broken and ragged “criminals” and how the trucks would gather those who stumbled and fell behind. In spite of the strict prohibition to communicate with us, they handed us bread, water and milk. This was a tiny flash of light in the darkness of our days. Further encouragement reaching us was the news of the contract signed between General Sikorsky and the Soviet authorities about the freeing, with amnesty, of Polish citizens from camps and prisons. While awaiting the anticipated freedom, I met, on the way to the prison, Dr. Nachum Gitler and Pessach Pakatz from Pinsk.

In the meantime, we were organized in large cells that held 160 people. There were 11 Jews: 7 Pinskers, 1 Warsawian, Nechemia and me, and 1 Soviet Jew. We Jews were together in one group.

The composition of the prisoners was very diverse; simple thieves, mostly young, Soviet bureaucrats, among them an engineer who spoke several languages who, with Soviet connections worked in various other countries (this was his fourth time of imprisonment, a veteran of 15 years total in prison…), there was also a group of evangelist farmers who appropriated for themselves a special corner in the cell where they prayed and sang, in deafening volume, their religious songs.

Trade between the prisoners was very lively. The bread, the soup, or the porridge we were given served as currency to make trades. I received a pair of galoshes for 2 portions of bread and 2 soups. Nechemia got, by giving up his food, a beautiful cotton suit, a pair of shoes, underwear, socks, soap and other things, and left the prison “wealthy.”

After two months I was freed, and with me, a Jew from Pinsk, Isaac Goldman and a farmer from Rokitno, a town close to Luninyets. We were of the first in our cell that were freed due to the contract mentioned above between General Sikorsky and the Soviet authorities. We left the prison on an autumn day in the evening, without a coin in our pockets, disconnected from home and family, strangers in the city – I was brooding over my mother, brother and sister –

[Page 73]

where are they? My friends were immersed in similar thoughts. We then finished a task of chopping wood for a bakery that would surely provide us with some bread to satisfy us.

Like butterflies drawn to light, our feet led us to a light-filled restaurant in which high level military men were dining. Our appearance in worn-out clothes, grown beards and pale faces attracted much attention. To their questions “Who are you?” We answered “We were released!” A Jewish army physician invited us to eat at his expense, others said come to the back and had a smoke with us, they also wanted to give us money. Of course, we refused. After wandering about looking for a place to stay on our first night of freedom, I stumbled onto the railway terminal station in Kirov. Sleep awaited me desperately, even though my “find” was a damp, cold floor, and my sleep-mates? Thousands of soldiers and refugees.

The six rubles I got for the galoshes were enough for a photo of me with my beard, a shave and a haircut, a telegram to Lizah Hofshtein in which I asked about my family's fate and a loaf of bread. The first five rubles I earned by loading cartons of matches. After that, we worked, a group of three releasees (Me, Dovid Bronner and Moshe from Pinsk), removing wood beams from the river.

Kirov's train station was a transfer point for thousands of releasees from the prisons and the camps. From there, most streamed to Central Asia. It was there I met Yaakov Bauman, despondent and talking as if losing his mind (but meanwhile, appreciative of finding shelter in Kirov's Main Post Office), also, I met Hershel Himmelfarb, the noted Bundist, torn and worn out. From fellow workers I learned that Yaakov Muzikant was freed and is in Syktyvkar (Capital of the Komi Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic in northern Russia), and that Nechemia Hofshtein was working as the manager of a pharmacy in Omutninsk, near Kirov. I got a position managing forest workers in the village of Bovinah, 6 kilometers from Kirov. I joined together with Dovid Bronner and Yaakov Bauman. Finally, I found out that my family was in the Altai region in Southern Siberia. I quit my job in Kirov and set out to find them.

At the time when the main stream of people was leaving the cold countries for the warm middle east, I went in the opposite direction. My driving desire was to meet with my family. On my way, in Molotov, I met the butcher Beryl Kodman. And finally, here in the village Zagaynovo, 20 kilometers from the train station in Altai, I finally met my mother, sister and brother – after rolling around in the train for three weeks. The joy of this reunion is impossible to put in words. They told me that before the pardon (amnesty) they lived in shacks and worked in the forests (my brother and sister gathered firewood), and that after the amnesty they settled in the village, rented a room from a farmer and were living together.

In Siberia, I met Yaakov Glauberman, Meyer-Lev Zmudiak and their families. I learned that the Gartzulin and Eisenberg families were in the Middle East, and Shlomo and Winosik Hofshtein went to live with Liza Hofshtein in Eastern Kazakhstan.

I correspond and receive letters from Pessach Pakatz, Ziskind Minkovsky, Nechemiah Hofshtein, Yaakov Muzikant, Yaakov Bauman, Feivel Dichter, Kasia Levin and others. My sister

[Page 74]

receives letters from Basya Lutzki (Daughter of R' Moshe-Yitzchak) working at the front as a nurse.

I work in a forest, about 75 kilometers from the train station. The availability of nutritional food is very bad. The best we can do for food is to exchange our work for a pail of potatoes. In the Soviet newspapers, the first notices of the killings and exterminations of Jews in the Nazi-invaded countries begin to appear. This causes us deep depression. To “safely” stay here in this dark forest, uprooted from home, the movements and Palestine, and from all those I was connected to in my youth? – Disturbing thoughts, both during work and afterwards.

But here comes a beam of light from the East: A telegram is received in the forest from Meilech Neustadt, from Allenby Street #115, Tel-Aviv, exactly while I was having supper with the workers. It's hard to describe the emotions that engulfed me. At first I was petrified. I could not believe my eyes. But shortly after, my eyes started tearing, incessantly. These were tears of joy and happiness. Indeed, we are not alone in our place! A friend's hand from the movement has been extended from Ha' Aretz [Palestine], the place for which we long and yearn. And perhaps – a fleeting thought – we may still succeed to make aliyah to Eretz-Yisrael?!

To this day I don't know how my friends in Eretz got my address. But with the renewal of this connection the bond increased with each communication. The parcels we received through the efforts of Shlomoh Wallner and the Organization of Luninyets Survivors in Palestine [today, Israel], had great material value, because we hungered for simple basic food, but their spiritual value was like a stimulant drug, strengthening our hope in the future – of far greater value than the material value of the packages.

The communications with friends in Russia and other countries grew by the day. Herzl Motznik and Aryeh Golub from Tel-Aviv keep advising me to travel from frozen Siberia to the warmth of Asia. From America, Saul Leon Hofshtein asks about his family in Luninyets. From Canada, Mary Frumkin asks about her family. Tannenbaum, a Stolin chasid now in New York, who came from Kovrin, asks about the fate of the Rabbis of Stolin and Karlin.

Our economic situation is improving. On one hand are the packages, and on the other hand we received over 1,000 kilograms of potatoes, tomatoes, cucumbers, and melons, etc. from the vegetable gardens which my sister worked at so successfully (she'd never worked in agriculture before).

At the same time the Polish army under General Andres is leaving Russia. On the way to Iran many are the Jews who want to join him, but the General, renowned for antisemitism, is not enthusiastic about having many Jews join him. We know of only family from our town that connected with him: Alizah Ozochovsky-Glauberman and her husband.

We move from the village to the district town of Troitsk. I transfer my friends from prison here: Yaakov Bauman and Dovid Bronner. My brother has been conscripted into the Army. Meanwhile, they are imprisoning people again. This time it is in connection with the former Poles not accepting Soviet citizenship. They were ordered to get Soviet passports, and when they didn't comply, they were imprisoned. We were informed of the detention, for reasons unknown, of Beilah Gratzolin and her sister, of Ziskind, Minkovsky, Shalom Schwartz, Globinsky from Brisk and others. Parcels from Iran are received regularly from the Sochnut, as well as greetings from Shaul Myerov from the “uncles” Reiss and Neustadt, but in addition he sent us worrying news from Warsaw about what Frumkah and Tzviyah occasionally write to him…

[Page 75]

Meetings

The meetings came about unintentionally. The Jews of Russia, disconnected from World Jewry for 25 years and more, thirsted for meetings with Polish Jews. Until the break-out of WWII their lives had been tossed about to the breaking point, and they never tired of listening to our stories, hearing about our hopes, our struggles and wars, and our accomplishments in Eretz Yisrael.

Due to my work, I am being transferred with my family to Barnaul, the capital of Altai [Southern Siberia]. There, I met with a lecturer in the Soviet High-School who was once a member of the central committee of the Russian Zionist Youth, and he listened with tears in his eyes as I told him about our organization in Poland until 1939, about the “Pioneers”, the Kibbutzim, the Histadrut now in Palestine, and on and on.

In Novosibirsk I met the son of a Jewish family from Leningrad, a medical student, fluent in many languages, who knew nothing about Judaism. On vacation in a Siberian city, he got to know a Jewish girl from Lithuania who'd been sent there as a Shaliach [messenger], and she taught him a little about Jewish history and Zionism, Dr. Herzl, Dr. Weitzman, and Eretz Yisrael that was being built… The youth returned home and railed against his mother for raising him without the values he just heard about. When he learned I had been in Eretz Yisrael, he wouldn't let go of me and asked me over and over again to tell him about it. I had a sense that this youth, child of the Soviet administration and it's education system, had been born anew, and turned, in front of my eyes, into a faithful Jew devoted to his people. In the local synagogues (as I discovered, at that time, synagogues were established only in Novosibirsk and Tomask) on Shabbat, there were about 10 Minyans praying, among them quite a few soldiers. There I met with the families of Noah Plaksman, Mordechai-Yosef and Zina and with member Alter Levi from Lakhvah [Belarus].

And again an experience: On my travel to Omsk to meet with my brother I found Kasia Levin and Yakov Musikant. In Omsk I also met a Jewish Soviet engineer, a relative of [Chaim] Weitzman, despondent for being disconnected from all his family in Palestine and from Judaism in general.

In the summer of 1944, the Red Army liberates Luninyets from the hands of the Nazis. Nechemia Hofstein who was visiting there writes he is broken and destroyed by the sights and could not stay there. All our families were destroyed, the town burned down, our properties robbed and in the hands of the local hooligans. In their Soviet nickel beds were our pillows and blankets. Our closets with the big mirrors full of the clothes of the dead, the buffets, the tables, the chairs, sewing machines, the precious curtains – all of the stolen items – decorating their homes.

And here in Barnaul arrives Hirsch Leib Zmodiak from Luninyets, a released disabled soldier from the Polish army who also reports on what he saw in Luninyets, and in his hands are photos of mass graves of our brothers and sisters. Among everything else, he describes that during the siege of Berlin Hershel Beilin was killed, and that he himself was crippled.

In addition, Feivel Dichter also writes what he saw with his own eyes: Two enormous mass graves

[Page 76]

in which are buried all the town's Jews, and all their properties and belongings are in the hands of the goyim [gentiles]. The joy of liberation from the Nazis is quickly abated. What good is the liberation when the city is completely devoid of Jews? Who is there for us? What is there for us?

With the total defeat of Hitler in May, 1945 and the end of the war, hope of leaving Siberia grew rapidly. Rumors were flying: Here was an announcement in the Soviet newspapers about Truman's plan to enable 100 thousand Jews to emigrate to Eretz Yisrael, and it was understood by the Jews that the intent was directed at us, the Polish Jews. But then Soviet radio announced, in July, 1945, that a contract between the Polish and Soviet governments related to the return of former Polish citizens to their homes in Poland was formulated, and the joy quickly sank.

Registration of returnees to Poland was handled by the Union of Polish Patriots. The Barnaul branch of the Union counted about 1050 Jews among 1200 Polish citizens, and I was put in charge of this local chapter. My mission was quite delicate… Propaganda about leaving Soviet citizenship was forbidden, and at the same time, bitter tidings reached us about the burning of the Synagogue in Karkov, pogroms against Jews in Poland, throwing Jews out of trains and so on. What's to be done? Return to Hell? Every Jew had to make his own decision, yet in spite of all this they all registered to return to Poland.

On the brink of liberation and returning home and reconnecting with the free world, that in her soul she had so longed and yearned for, she was defeated by the Typhus disease that lasted 4 weeks.

All our attempts and efforts to save her were to no avail; on August 2^nd, 1945, the 23^rd of Menachem Av, 5705, she expired, in a foreign land… With this our Mother lost her only precious, beloved daughter, and I the sister I had devoted myself to most of my life. Cut off in her prime; there's no consolation for us.

We left Siberia in May, 1946, in a special train. In our cabin were the Zymodiak, Yakov Gloiberman, Yakov Boiman, David Bronner families, as well as the Vinikov family from Baranavichy and a woman, Pintoswitz from Lithuania. The trip took 4 weeks. In Petropavlvosk we met Shlomo Kaplanski and his family, in Omsk – Yakov Musikant. All were returning to Poland. We are traveling by way of Moskow and Minsk, we cross the former (till 1939) Soviet border. Here are the cities: Stawiski, Baranavichy, Skawina, Brest (Brest-Litovsk). They were all close to my heart when they were full of Jews, but now – they're strange to me. The Goyim [gentiles] murdered and “inherited” their belongings…

We enter the renewed Poland. The Poles look at us with daggers in their eyes, their looks full of hatred and murder. They ask “How were so many Jews left over?” Here we were sure Hitler murdered them all, to the last one, and here a shit-stream of them is covering Poland all over!

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This “welcome” was not what we expected when during the long dark Siberian nights we longed for the peace and consolation that would come when we were “home” again. Increasing thoughts entered my mind: What power protected me and those like me from being killed and decimated like all the others? The answer: Zionism! Because of “it” I was arrested and sent deep into Russia, and because of “it” I don't despair now, even in the bitter circumstances we find ourselves. Our true home is no longer here, but there, in Our Land. It was from there that we received the first joyful news during the dark, Siberian nights; It is to there we must strive and finally arrive.

I arrived in Łódź. I veered right away to the Central Committee of Po'alei-Tzion, I meet with Stefan Greek and Shmuel Tzetzik, they fill me in on all the activities going on in the Movement. And about the divisions within the Map'ai Movement in the Land. This upset me very much. My only consolation was that in Poland there were no such disagreements. Leading us further west, to the areas freed from the Germans, to Lower Silesia. Our stop now is in Wroclaw – formerly, Germany's Breslau.

I want to keep going further West, but the Central Committee of Po'alei-Tzion explain the need to temporarily absorb the large stream of Polish Jews and direct them forward on their way to Eretz Yisrael.

With all my heart and soul I dedicate myself to the Movement. Daily, the stream of people grows and bursts through the borders, their destination: Palestine. The number of Jews leaving Poland was particularly large after the Kielce Pogroms [July 4, 1946]. The mass migration out of Poland was at its highest; it was our Movement that led the way.

Among these Jews were also folks from Luninyets: The Kasiah Levin family, Meyer-Leib Zmodiak, Yitzchak Kuznitz, the Isar brothers,(By the way, Isar, who was in Auschwitz met with his brother in Germany – he did not know that he had survived). Tuviah and Hershel Boswitz. Slowly but surely the survivors from Luninyets gathered together; about 30 families arrived. We are in communication with our people in America and Eretz Yisrael. From the Luninyets “Relief” groups in New York we receive $300 and divide it between the survivors. This is all due to the efforts of member Michael Lutzki. From the Survivors-of-Luninyets-Organization in Palestine we get letters, bulletins, advice and answers to our questions.

On the 5^th of Elul, 5707 [August 8,1947] all the survivors of Luninyets gathered in the Synagogue in Breslau to arrange a memorial service for the deceased in our town that were murdered in the Luninyets ghetto 5 years ago. The elderly Noach Plaksman led the service – everyone's eyes streaming tears as they looked around at who was left from a town that had once been full off Jews. We are just shadows saved from the fire, on the other hand, excited by the very fact of the meeting and getting together. Here I am, a visitor in the former prison camp in Silesia. I stand among piles of articles, especially the high pile of children's shoes, I come across books and newspapers in Yiddish and Hebrew. They are now stamped with library stamps from Baltic countries. I choose to remember the literature leaves of the past, and imagine my astonishment when I saw in one of the journals a description of the Tel-Chai Library in Luninyets. I had worked there in my cultural activities for many years. There was an echo here of a distant sound that faded and disappeared…

The Jews of Poland, though much reduced in numbers, still had within them the enthusiasm of the “old days.” We renewed the Zionistic work. Funds were raised for the Keren-Hayesod and the Keren-Kayemet, and Hebrew schools were opened.

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With the proclamation of the Jewish State, the vestige of the Jewish population in Poland spontaneously demonstrated their joy and solidarity with their brothers in Israel. In Wroclaw I appear at an assembly dedicated to the establishment of the Jewish State. Thousands of Jews attended. I ended my speech calling out and honoring the first President, Dr. Chaim Weitzman, and the Prime Minister, our member, David Ben-Gurion. The thousands assembled there cheered. Protests started to take place in the city, sweeping everything away, including the communists…

The Arabs attacks in Israel provoked enlistments in Poland to the Haganah. Hundreds of young men and women volunteered. They had to pass a military course in a special Haganah camp in Bolkow (within 2 months, about 3,000 youths had enlisted). A special endeavor was announced to raise monies for the Haganah, and in a short time enormous sums were collected. I was in charge of conscriptions in Lower Silesia.

In any case, none of these activities brought me closer to the illusion of continued Zionist Movements and activities in Poland. I realized and knew: Whatever Jewish life was like in Poland until 1939 will never be the same again! This is no longer a place to hesitate or delay! In October, 1948, we left Poland, my mother and I, and ascended [made aliyah] to the land of our longing and aspirations, Israel.

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