Glossary

Following is a glossary of terms used in the synopsis and elsewhere on this site to help give you a better understanding of warsaw in context.

ANIELEWICZ, MORDECHAI (1919-1943)

Warsaw’s main character, Roman, is inspired by the extraordinary life of Commander Anielewicz. At 23, Anielewicz lead the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising of 1943—the largest Jewish uprising during the Holocaust and the first urban uprising in German-occupied Europe. He was leader of the Zionist youth movement Hashomer Hatzair (The Youth Guard), and in 1941 established the Jewish Fighting Organization (Zydowska Organizacja Bojowa or ZOB) to fight Nazi deportations from the Warsaw Ghetto. Anielewicz was killed in battle in the ZOB bunker at Mila 18. He is considered a great hero of the Holocaust for his bravery, leadership, and galvanizing resistance efforts that inspired many acts of revolt in the ghettos and concentration camps of Europe.

ARYAN

Aryan is derived from the Sanskrit Arya, which means “noble” or “honorable.” By the end of the 19th century, Aryan was applied to individuals who spoke any Indo-European language. The Nazis, however, primarily applied the term to those of Northern European racial background. The Nazis viewed individuals of Germanic background as the best examples of superior, or Aryan, race.

BABI YAR

A ravine in Kiev, the capital of Ukraine. Over the course of two days, September 29-30 1941, forces murdered 33,771 Jewish civilians at Babi Yar. The Babi Yar massacre is considered to be the largest single massacre in the history of the Holocaust. In the months that followed, thousands more were taken to Babi Yar where they were shot. It is estimated that more than 100,000 people, mostly Jewish civilians, were executed at Babi Yar by the Nazis during WWII.

CONCENTRATION CAMPS

Prison camps constructed to hold Jews, Gypsies, political and religious opponents, resisters, homosexuals, and others that the Nazis considered “unfit to live” or “enemies of the state.” Before the end of World War II, more than 100 concentration camps had been created across German-occupied Europe.

DEPORTATION

During their quest to conquer Europe and rearrange the ethnic composition of Eastern Europe, the Nazis used deportation by train to forcibly remove members of ethnic groups from the territory on which they lived. Ultimately, they intended to remove all Jews and “undesirables” from Europe through systematic mass murder.

ERETZ-ISRAEL

Literally "the land of Israel", another name for Palestine prior to World War II.

THE FINAL SOLUTION

The Final Solution refers to the Nazis' plan to engage in systematic genocide against the European Jewish population during World War II. Beginning in December 1941, Jews were rounded up and sent to extermination camps. The program was deceptively disguised as "resettlement in the East." In its entirety, The Final Solution consisted of gassings, shootings, random acts of terror, disease, and starvation that accounted for the deaths of about six million Jews and minorities. The implementation of The Final Solution resulted in the most deadly phase of the Holocaust. It refers to “The final solution to the Jewish question in Europe.” The expression reflects the belief that the Jewish European population itself posed a question and a problem.

FORCED LABOR

The Nazis subjected millions of people (both Jews and other victim groups) to forced labor under brutal conditions. From the establishment of the first Nazi concentration camps and detention facilities in the winter of 1933, forced labor— often pointless and humiliating, and imposed without proper equipment, clothing, nourishment, or rest—formed a core part of the concentration camp regimen. The Nazis also pursued a conscious policy of "annihilation through work," under which certain categories of prisoners were literally worked to death. Under this policy, prisoners were forced to work under conditions that would directly and deliberately lead to illness, injury, and death.

FÜHRER (LEADER or GUIDE)

In German, führer is derived from the verb führen or “to lead.” Adolf Hitler (1889-1945) gave himself this title, designating his supreme power in the German Parliament. Hitler was leader of the German Nazi party and, from 1933 until his death, the dictator of Germany. He rose from the bottom of society to conquer Germany, then most of Europe. He built a Fascist regime unparalleled for barbarism and terror. His rule resulted in the destruction of the German nation-state and its society, the ruin of much of Europe's traditional structure, and in the extermination of more than six million Jews and minorities. Although the war was lost by early 1945, Hitler insisted that Germany fight to the death. On April 30, 1945, Hitler committed suicide rather than be captured alive.

GENTILE

An anglicized version of the Latin word gentiles, meaning of or belonging to a clan or tribe. Today, the primary meaning of gentile is non-Jew.

GHETTOS

Otherwise known as Jewish Quarters, German forces established ghettos to segregate Jews from cities. Often surrounded by barbed wire or walls, the ghettos were characterized by overcrowding, malnutrition, and heavy forced labor. They were established mostly in Eastern Europe (e.g., Lodz, Warsaw, Vilna, Riga, and Minsk). All ghettos were eventually dissolved and its residents murdered.

GOLEM

In Jewish tradition, the golem is known as an artificial creature created by magic, often to serve its creator. In Hebrew, golem stands for shapeless mass that is typically created from mud. The earliest stories of golems date to early Judaism, where they were a creation of those who were very holy and close to God. The most famous golem narrative involves a 16th century rabbi, who is reported to have created a golem to defend his Prague ghetto from anti-Semitic attacks.

HIMMLER, HEINRICH (1900-1945)

As head of the SS and the secret police, Himmler had control over the vast Nazi empire: all SS formations, police forces, Gestapo, and concentration and forced labor camps. Himmler was responsible for carrying out “The Final Solution," which was the destruction of all European Jews. He committed suicide in 1945 before he could be brought to trial.

THE HOME ARMY

With over 400,000 members, Armia Krajowa (the Polish Home Army; AK) was the dominant Polish resistance movement in World War II German-occupied Poland. Loyal to the exiled Polish government, they would often wear stolen German clothes to battle Nazi forces. The ZOB placed high hopes on gaining the support of the Home Army, which was the largest anti-Nazi resistance organization in Europe. However only a small number of AK soldiers who believed in the solidarity of Polish resistance regardless of religious differences took the Jewish smugglers of the Jewish Fighting Organization aside and supplied them with small arms and training. Even so, by February 1943, the ZOB had obtained only 50 pistols (many of them defective), 50 grenades and four kilograms of explosives from the AK.

JEWISH BADGE

The Nazis ordered Jews to wear identifying badges or armbands: the most common was a white armband with the blue Star of David.

JEWISH COUNCIL (JUDENRAT)

Council of Jewish leaders established by German forces to implement Nazi orders in German-occupied areas. The German authorities placed responsibility on the Judenrat to deliver 6,000 Jews daily to the rail spur north of the ghetto, known as the Umschlagplatz for deportation.

JEWISH FIGHTING ORGANIZATION (ZOB)

A prominent Jewish resistance group in the Warsaw Ghetto in Poland during World War II that was formed when three underground political youth movements united. The ZOB had an estimated 450-500 members, both women and men, who were carefully vetted to avoid potential informers. Most were under 25, and the youngest was 13. Under the command of 23-year old Mordechai Anielewicz, the ZOB called for Jews to resist deportation, heroically leading the fight against the Nazis in the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising.

MILA STREET

The bunker at 18 Mila Street was constructed by a group of underworld smugglers in 1943, and became the tactical headquarters for the Jewish Fighting Organization led by Commander Mordechai Anielewicz during the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising. On May 8, 1943, three weeks after the start of the uprising, the bunker was attacked by the Nazis with 300 resistance fighters inside who ultimately died fighting for their freedom and families.

MOLOTOV COCKTAIL

A Molotov cocktail (petrol bomb) is a homemade weapon that consists of a glass bottle semi-filled with flammable liquid, usually gasoline or alcohol. The mouth of the bottle is stopped up with a cork (or rubber, glass, plastic), and a cloth rag fixed securely around the mouth. The weapon is used by first soaking the rag in a flammable liquid prior to using it, lighting the rag, and throwing the bottle at the target. The bottle shatters on impact, spilling the flammable liquid over the target, which is ignited by the burning rag.

NAZI

The National Socialist German Workers Party: a right-wing, anti-Semitic political party formed in Germany in 1919 and headed by Adolf Hitler until 1945.

PALESTINE

One of the ultimate goals of Zionists was the establishment of an independent Jewish state, and Palestine was named as the ideal.

PARTISAN

A member of a resistance group operating secretly within enemy lines, using hit-and-run guerrilla tactics against occupying forces. During World War II, this term was applied to resistance fighters in Nazi-occupied countries.

SS

German abbreviation for Schutzstaffel (Protection Squad), usually written with two lightning symbols. Originally formed as Hitler's personal bodyguards, the SS was transformed by Heinrich Himmler into the most powerful organization of the Nazi party. In mid-1934, they established control of police and security systems, forming the basis of the Nazi police state, and were a major instrument of racial terror in concentration camps and occupied Europe. The SS is best known for carrying out The Final Solution: the destruction of European Jews.

TREBLINKA

A Nazi extermination camp 50 miles northeast of Warsaw. Treblinka was established in May 1942 along with the Warsaw-Bialystok railway line, and nearly 750,000 Jews and at least 2,000 Gypsies were murdered there. The camp operated until the fall of 1943, when the Nazis destroyed the camp in an attempt to conceal all traces of their crimes.

UMSCHLAGPLATZ (UMSCHLAG)

A collection point located in a square in the Warsaw Ghetto where Jews were rounded up for deportation to Treblinka.

UNDERGROUND

An organized group acting in secrecy to oppose the government or, during war, to resist occupying forces.

THE WARSAW GHETTO

The Warsaw Ghetto in Poland was the largest of the Jewish ghettos established by Nazi Germany during the Holocaust in World War II. More than 350,000 Jews—about 30 percent of the city's prewar population—were confined in 2.4 percent of the city's area. All Jewish residents of Warsaw were ordered into the ghetto, which was sealed off from the rest of the city in November 1940. Surrounded by a wall over 10 feet high and topped with barbed wire, the Germans guarded the ghetto boundary to prevent movement between the ghetto and the rest of Warsaw. In its three years of its existence, starvation, disease, and deportations to concentration and extermination camps dropped the population of the ghetto from an estimated high of 450,000 to 37,000.

THE WARSAW GHETTO UPRISING (April 19, 1943–May 8, 1943)

The largest Jewish uprising during the Holocaust and the first urban uprising in German-occupied Europe. The revolt became a symbol of the indomitableness of the human spirit. On April 19, 1943, the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising began when German troops penetrated the ghetto to begin a third round of mass deportations. Led by the brave Commander Mordechai Anielewicz, the ZOB faced a formidable force of 2,000 armed Nazi’s, yet they were unable to defeat the Jews. The ZOB headquarters on 18 Mila Street fell on May 8, 1943, and Anielewicz died in battle with his heroic fellow soldiers.

THE YOUNG GUARD (HA-SHOMER HA-TZA'IR)

A Zionist youth political and social organization in Poland prior to World War II that advocated immigration to eretz-Israel upon turning eighteen.

ZIONISM

An international political movement that supports a homeland for the Jewish people in the Land of Israel (Zion). Formally organized in the late19th century, the movement was successful in establishing the State of Israel in 1948 as the world's first and only modern Jewish State. To some, the persistence of anti-Semitism seemed to be an ineradicable feature of European non-Jewish society. According to Zionists, the only way to solve the conundrum was to achieve a political sovereign state for the Jews. A state in Palestine came to be regarded as one of the foremost goals of the movement.

ZOB (JEWISH FIGHTING ORGANIZATION)

A prominent Jewish resistance group in the Warsaw Ghetto in Poland during World War II that was formed when three underground political youth movements united. The ZOB had an estimated 450-500 members, both women and men, who were carefully vetted to avoid potential informers. Most were under 25, and the youngest was 13. Under the command of 23-year old Mordechai Anielewicz, the ZOB called for Jews to resist deportation, heroically leading the fight against the Nazis in the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising.