Political and Cultural Response to the Jews Conditions in the Ghetto - Case Study Example

Political and cultural response to the Jews conditions in the Ghetto Introduction The concentration of Jewish and other non-ethnic Germans in the ghettos in Poland among other parts of Europe was a move that sought to portray the might of Germans in the periods leading to the Second World War. The ghettos were restricted concentration camps hat lacked any social amenity. The Jews lived in deplorable conditions. The Lodz ghetto and the Warsaw ghetto were among the largest of the Jewish ghettos in Poland. Key among the differences in the two ghettos was the fact that Warsaw revolted while Lodz did not. Such a major difference in the structure and the management of the two ghettos showed varied Jewish responses to the oppression. This portrayed the difference in the living conditions in the two ghettos as the discussion below portrays. The holocaust was a traumatizing period of both anguish and pain as millions of Jewish and other non-ethnic Germans faced cruel murder in the hands of the dictatorial Hitler. Germans occupied Poland and sought to eradicate other non-Germans. However, before executing them in the giant gallows the German government created ghettos. Ghettos were archaic settlement schemes in which the Jewish lacked any resources and lived in squalor as they awaited their death (Sierakowiak Alan and Kamil 15). Additionally, the Germans created the ghettos in a bid to contain the other populations and use them as sources of labor in the large plantations and other industries. The cultural and political composition of the Jewish influenced their response to the controlled settlements. As stated earlier, Warsaw ghetto revolted while Lodz did not. Such discrepancies in the Jewish response showed the differences in the political and cultural organization of the Jewish. The Jews responded systematically to the inhumane and deplorable conditions in the ghettos. Some of the Jews thought of taking up arms and engaging in armed resistance against the Nazis while others conformed to the deplorable conditions thus nursed their hope for life. Warsaw ghetto was a typical example of armed resistance in an attempt by the Jews to discourage further brutality and break from the social bondage created by the ghettos. The Jews lost all their civil rights and freedoms in the ghettos. They lived in squalor with no food, water and electricity. Such was a major disruption of their social structure. Prior to the German occupation of Poland, Jews enjoyed civil liberties. In fact, they had undertaken varied investments in various parts of the country. The Germans disrupted such a peaceful social structure replacing the Jews societies with the ghettos, which served as gathering point for the Jews as they waited their execution. The intention of the ghettos was the major psychological torture as the Jews waited for their brutal executions. However, some of the ghettos such as Lodz immediately transformed and became productive for the Germans. The Germans therefore sustained the ghetto for a longer duration while using the Jews as sources of labor. Eventually the Germans annihilated both the Jews and the ghetto. Warsaw on the other hand remained a temporary gathering point as the Germans gathered the Jews for execution. The brutality of the exercise coupled with the deplorable living condition characterized with starvation and death, led to the attempts by the Jews to resist any further German occupation. Life in the Lodz ghetto was better than in Warsaw. As such, the Jews living in Lodz had hope in life. The hope to live another day even in the deplorable condition was a major motivating factor that discouraged any thoughts of resistance. The ghetto just as any other was overpopulated and completely sealed off on May 7, 1940. The Jews lived in overpopulated apartments. A single room housed more than seven people. Only a few of the apartments had running water and electricity. The German officers in the camps discouraged the use of electricity a feature that made the electricity obsolete. Lodz contained 165,000 people in 1.6 square miles (Trunk and Robert 22). The people lacked such basic services as sewer and clean water. Such conditions enhanced the prevalence of diseases among other forms of social ills. Prior to the Second World War, Warsaw was the center of Jewish life in Poland. The city was home to close to a half a million Jews. Germans occupied Warsaw and formed the ghetto in 1940. The Warsaw ghetto was unique owing to the large number of Jews who occupied the city. The Germans therefore sought to deal with the Jews effectively in order to minimize their political might. The ghetto was in a form of fortress with high walls reinforced with barbed wire on top. This was to discourage the Jews from interacting with the rest of Warsaw. The Germans would later beginning transporting the Jews to their death camps a feature that lead to an uprising in the camp in 1943. The untrained, unarmed and starved Jews initiated street war uprisings. They killed fifteen Germans and caused mayhem. However, the Germans overpowered them and obliterated the ghetto. The Lodz and Warsaw ghettos had a number of both similarities and differences all of which show intricate features of the Jews political and cultural features that influenced their response to the German occupation and subsequent concentration in the ghettos. The living conditions in the ghettos were deplorable (Sierakowiak Alan and Kamil 65). The Jews lived in crowded houses, lacked food, and such basic services as fresh water, sewer services and electricity. The living conditions contributed to a deplorable social welfare of the Jews. The creation of the ghettos was a strategy by the Germans. The Germans turned the ghettos into isolated economic entities. Besides the lack of resources and the isolation, the ghettos caused rapid impoverishment of the Jews thereby increasing the number of Jews that required welfare assistance. In the ghettos, the Jews did not enjoy any freedoms. They lost both their property and freedoms. This weakened their political and cultural institutions thus making them vulnerable to the antics of the Germans. Warsaw resisted Germans while Lodz remained peaceful and productive for a longer duration. Such was a major difference in the structure of the ghettos. The Germans ensured a complete isolation of Lodz. The location of the ghetto was strategic for the Germans. The location was on an isolated northeastern part of Lodz. The surrounding was dry area that the Germans had cleared thereby making it difficult for any Jews to escape from the ghetto. Additionally, the Germans reinforced the security of the ghetto with a series of barbed wires thus isolating the ghetto from the rest of the society. The Jews in Lodz became a major source of labor for Germans as Lodz became an industrialized ghetto. As discussed earlier, Jews in Lodz ghetto had hopes of living longer lives even if in the ghettos. Unlike the Warsaw ghetto, Lodz ghetto had electricity and piped water albeit in just a few of the apartments. Additionally, the Germans gave out rations that sustained the Jews. Additionally, the Jews worked in the various industries. As such, they often spent most of their time working, had minimal time to rest, and plan any form of uprising. The complete isolation of the ghetto was yet another fundamental factor that discouraged any form of armed uprising, as was the case in Warsaw. The Jews in Lodz ghetto could not acquire any form of arms owing to the lack of any interactions with the rest of the society. The complete isolation of the ghetto thus ensured that the Jews remained unarmed and overused thus unable to plot any form of uprising against the Germans. The above discussion shows a number of factors that discouraged any form of armed uprising in Lodz thereby showing the difference between Lodz ghetto and the Warsaw ghetto. The situation was a lot different in Warsaw. As explained earlier, Warsaw was the Jewish center. This implied that the Jews had invested in the development of the city. The ghetto was thereby a major social deterrence to Jews who lost their wealth and investments with the German occupation of the city. The brutality and the extremely deplorable situation in the ghetto were yet other fundamental factors that necessitated the armed uprising. The Jews in Warsaw ghetto lacked food besides the numerous other social amenities such as water and electricity. The Germans were brutal and carried out ruthless execution of Jews in the ghetto. The deplorable condition of the Warsaw ghetto coupled with the brutality with which the Germans executed the Jews resulted in the loss of hope for the Germans (Trunk and Robert 77). Engaging in the uprising was therefore a way of lessening their tribulations since they believed they would die anyway. In retrospect, Jews had diverse political and cultural response to the creation of ghettos owing to the strategies employed by the Germans. The ghettos disrupted an otherwise peaceful Jews social structure. Additionally, the Jews overpowered the Jews. As such, they employed brutality against the Jews and set out to kill the Germans by providing them temporary gathering in the ghettos. Warsaw revolted owing to the structures in the ghettos. Germans were brutal and the living conditions dare. The loss of hope encouraged the Jews to attempt a form of resistance unlike in Lodz where the Jews worked in industries and received rations. Work cited Sierakowiak, Dawid, Alan Adelson, and Kamil Turowski. The Diary of Dawid Sierakowiak: Five Notebooks from the Łódź Ghetto. New York: Oxford University Press, 1996. Internet resource. Trunk, Isaiah, and Robert M. Shapiro. Łodz Ghetto: A History. Bloomington, Ind: Indiana University Press, 2006. Print. Read More