Mordechai Anilewitz

When Mordechai Anilewitz was a child, it was popular for Polish gentile toughs to attack young Jews - just for the fun. Most Jewish youths ran and hid, but not Mordechai. He not only stood up to the bullying Poles, but fought back fiercely. When the toughs saw Mordechai coming, they would detour to stay out of his way. If Mordechai heard shouts for help, he was out in a minute with his youth group to help the victims. He never started a fight, but he never backed down either.

When the Nazis occupied Warsaw and established the ghetto, Mordechai was a young man. He sought ways to help his fellow Jews, and at the end of 1942, he organized a fighting unit. He operated a secret radio station, informing Jews of the ghetto what was happening outside. He wrote short, powerful articles for an underground journal called “Against The Stream.” Copies of this journal were found in all corners of the country - far beyond the ghetto walls.

As a member of the Zionist youth organization, HaShomer HaZair (The Young Watchman) he became known as “Chaver (friend, comrade) Mordechai.” The name stuck until he was killed.

Mordechai believed everyone in the ghetto was doomed. “The question is” he asked, “how shall we die?” His answer: “We have decided to die in battle.” He began organizing all young and middle-aged people in the ghetto for battle - girls and women, boys and men. He drilled, trained and obtained weapons, some purchased at enormous cost and smuggled into the ghetto. Grenades were produced by hand, at the rate of about fifty a day.

In January 1943, the Germans rounded up a few hundred Jews for deportation to the death camps. They dragged them to the Umschlagplatz, the roundup place in the ghetto where victims were herded into cattle trains to be taken to concentration camps. This time Mordechai entered the crowd with his comrades. At a signal, they attacked the Germans. The Jews fled; the Germans scattered in confusion, leaving behind their wounded and dead. The young fighters stood their ground. Mordechai, finishing his ammunition, attacked a Nazi with his bare fists, taking the German’s weapons.

The deportations stopped for three months. The Nazis were preparing themselves for a terrible battle. But the ghetto fighters were also preparing themselves. Mordechai worked day and night. He was everywhere. He helped dig bunkers - some quite large - with secret tunnels. (A bunker is an underground hiding place with ventilator shafts for air.) Mordechai also helped set up tank-blocks at entrances to buildings. He organized collecting arms and was in constant contact with comrades on the other side of the ghetto walls. He drew detailed maps of the ghetto - every alley and passageway was marked for the fighters.

To a friend he wrote:
 

We don’t have a moment’s rest. We sleep in our clothes. At
every entry to the ghetto we stand on guard day and night. We
are making the final preparations. Soon we shall have to separate
ourselves from life and go to the place that no one wants to go.
But ours is the correct path. We cultivated in our hearts the idea
of revolt - this is the path of the Jewish youth - be well, Chaverim

On Sunday, April 18, 1943, the leaders of the central ghetto met. At the end of the meeting, Mordechai, chairman of the group, distributed weapons and baskets of handmade bombs, known as “Molotov cocktails.” Some food was distributed, and poison for fighters caught, who did not want to be tortured by the Nazis. Houses were barricaded with furniture and sandbags, pillows were placed on window sills for support and protection. Finally an all-night watch was set up in the ghetto. On the eve of the first Seder of Passover, Jews from the Aryan side of Warsaw sneaked into the ghetto to participate in a Seder with their brethren. On Monday, the Nazis attacked. Afraid to face the fire of the Jews, they sent other groups ahead; first the Jewish police and then German and Ukrainian columns. Following these came a squadron of motorcyclists, heavy trucks, infantry with heavy machine-guns, ambulances, a field kitchen, field telephones and twelve Panzer armed vehicles.

On the main streets, they set up headquarters with tables and benches. Confident of their superior strength, the German column, singing loudly, reached the corners of the main streets. Suddenly, a hail of Molotov cocktails sent them fleeing in panic, leaving behind their dead and wounded. One tank after another was hit with well-aimed handmade bombs; the men driving them burned alive inside. Panic broke out among the Germans. The Nazi report to headquarters was: “The Jewish resistance was unexpected, unusually strong, and a great surprise.”

On April 23, Mordechai wrote to a friend:
 

Be well my friend. Perhaps we shall meet again. The main
thing is that the dream of my life has come true. I was fortunate
enough to witness Jewish defense in the ghetto in all its greatness
and glory.

The fighting continued, but lacking reinforcements of arms and ammunitions, the Jews grew weaker. On May 8, the Germans found the bunker at 18 Mila Street. This was the main bunker of many fighters, including Mordechai Anilewitz. The Nazis threw poison gas into the bunker and shot all those who came out. Whether Mordechai was killed by the gas, or whether he committed suicide, we shall probably never know.

Most of the fighters were killed, but a few of those who had fought against the Nazis escaped through the sewers and joined resistance fighters in the forests.

The Jews in the ghetto, with their pitiful weapons, held out longer against their Nazi enemies than the Poles had held out when the Germans entered Poland.

The Holocaust - A History of Courage and Resistance
Bea Stadtler, Behrman House, Inc. 1974