The Palestinian Ghetto

Following are some comments and observations I have gathered from various sources regarding ghetto life.  It is not a pretty picture. 

I have not attempted to organize the comments in any meaningful narrative.  Each one stands alone.

I will add no further comment, other than the citing of the sources at the end of the post.

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…when all hope for survival was abandoned, the ghetto underground staged an uprising…several hundred…began an armed insurrection against the troops… (1)

…the area was completely cut off from the outside world: no food was allowed in, rubbish and waste were not collected, the dead lay on the streets and piled up in the bombed-out store fronts and the buildings were overcrowded, leading to the spread of diseases… (2)

It was created for the purpose of exploitation, terror, and persecution… (3)

Before the…invasion, [it] was an influential centre for [those] who had lived there… (3)

Only four guarded entrances allowed traffic to pass through. (3)

Young people…joined forces…to…organize resistance in the ghetto….  The group carried out a variety of resistance activities including…bombing…. (3)

It was an area of small primitive houses and no running water… (4)

The ghetto had two parts…. Each ghetto was enclosed by barbed wire and closely guarded. Both were overcrowded, with each person allocated less than ten square feet of living space. (4)

…they razed the ghetto to the ground with grenades and dynamite. (4)

The…ghetto had several…resistance groups. The resistance acquired arms, developed secret training areas in the ghetto… (4)

[Authorities] called for the final liquidation of the ghetto… (5)

The…propaganda blamed the killings on the [local commissioners]… (6)

Although [some] had also been among the victims of the massacre…they were collectively accused as a group…of having somehow been responsible for it. (6)

Internal passports were used to control the population, being necessary, for example, to obtain a medical prescription. (7)

Access to and from the ghetto could only be made through the police yard. People exiting or entering the ghetto were searched here and often beaten up. (7)

…the…ghettos had an internal government…. [W]hile some members of the Council tried to improve things… [the internal government] was a fiction, created to help the…annihilation of the…population…. (7)

Legally, food could only be purchased from shops within the ghetto, and only with ration books. What food was available was of poor quality. (7)

People working outside the ghetto tried to get food and bring into the ghetto, but it was extremely difficult to get it past the police checkpoint at the ghetto entrance. (7)

The housing problem in the ghetto was severe. Many houses had no electricity, plumbing, gas, or central heating. (7)

…there was only a single out-patient clinic available for medical care… (7)

The people were also under extreme psychological pressure and there were suicides. (7)

Some buildings in the ghetto had interior plumbing, however this failed during cold weather. (7)

The…authorities established a prison in the…ghetto….  Many were never seen again after being taken to the ghetto prison. (7)

Over the course of the summer…troops…killed more than 21,000…in a mass extermination program. (8)

The…[resistance]…was formed…in the…Ghetto. It took for its motto "We will not go like sheep to the slaughter" (8)

The goals of the [resistance] were to establish a means for the self-defence of the ghetto population, to sabotage…industrial and military activities… (8)

Unemployment was a major problem in the ghetto. Illegal workshops were created to manufacture goods to be sold illegally on the outside and raw goods were smuggled in… (9)

Smuggling was often the only source of subsistence for Ghetto inhabitants, who would otherwise have died of starvation. (9)

Over 100,000 of the Ghetto's residents died due to rampant disease or starvation, as well as random killings… (9)

The first instances of…armed resistance began that day. (9)

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1)      Białystok Ghetto

2)      Budapest Ghetto

3)      Kraków Ghetto

4)      Kovno Ghetto

5)      Łódź Ghetto

6)      Lwów Ghetto

7)      Riga Ghetto

8)      Vilna Ghetto

9)      Warsaw Ghetto