Poland’s highest authorities on Friday paid homage to the Jewish fighters who rose up 70 years ago against the German occupiers in what is known as the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising. President Bronislaw Komorowski led tributes at the Monument to the Ghetto Heroes in honor of the first and largest rebellion against the Germans during World War II. Also present were two survivors of the fighting, Simha Rotem and Havka Folman Raban; and many other dignitaries.
Komorowski bestowed one of the country's highest honors on the 88-year-old Rotem, the Grand Cross of the Order of the Rebirth of Poland.
Throughout Warsaw, national and city flags fluttered from city buses, trams and public buildings as authorities made an unprecedented effort to encourage Poles to remember the ghetto fighters and Jewish suffering during the war. It was the first time that churches in the capital rang their bells to mark the anniversary of the uprising.
On 19 April 1943, 750 poorly armed Jews began armed resistance to the German forces, who were sending ghetto residents to death camps. The revolt was crushed in May, and the ghetto was razed to the ground, its residents killed.
"The Nazis made a hell on earth of the ghetto," Komorowski said in a speech. "Persecuting the Jews appealed to the lowest of human instincts."
The events Friday followed an evening of commemorations. The Israel Philharmonic Orchestra, conducted by Zubin Mehta, performed works by Beethoven in Warsaw's Grand Theater in honor of the fighters- a gala event attended by Komorowski, Prime Minister Donald Tusk and Rotem. Before the concert, a cantor appeared on a stage designed to evoke the old ghetto and sang a prayer for Holocaust victims. The audience also rose and applauded Rotem.
