THE HOLOCAUST OF THE JEWS IN HALYCH DURING THE NAZI OCCUPATION: DOCUMENTS, TESTIMONIES AND NAMES

Abstract

Halych in the second half of the 19th century to the mid-20th century was one of the religious (Greek Catholics, Roman Catholics, Orthodox Christians, Jews, Karaites, and Protestants) and multiethnic centers in Eastern Galicia, among which the Jewish community held an important place in the economic, cultural, and social life of the town. However, the period of World War II proved catastrophic for the local Jewish community. Between 1941 and 1944, the Nazi occupation regime implemented the policy of the «Final Solution to the Jewish Question», which envisaged the complete destruction of Jews through looting, physical violence, mass arrests, executions, and deportations to concentration camps. Based on archival sources and video testimonies, the author reconstructs the chronology of anti#Jewish actions in the city of Halych that took place during 1941–1942. Special attention is given to the pogroms of April 1942, when the Nazis carried out the most massive and brutal reprisals against the local Jewish population. Archival documents have made it possible to identify the names of the main perpetrators of Holocaust crimes in the city and a partial list of victims, numbering over 300 individuals. Following the pogroms, a significant portion of Halych’s Jewish residents were deported to the Stanisławów ghetto and the death camps of Bełżec and Auschwitz. The author also provides the names ofJewish families and their members who managed to survive this tragic period in their history. This study is an attempt to honor the victims of the genocide of Jews in Halych and a call for collective memory of the tragic events of the 1940s.