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Jews lived in Poland for 800 years before the Nazi occupation. On the eve of the occupation 3.3 million Jews lived in Poland – more than any other country in Europe. Their percentage among the general population – about 10% – was also the highest in Europe.After the conquest of Poland by Germany and the Soviet Union in September 1939, most of the Jews remaining within the area occupied by Germany – approximately 1

Murder of the Jews of Poland Skip to main content Accessibility High contrast Reverse contrast (yellow over black) No css Reset Choose Language English עברית Français Deutsch Español Русский عربي فارسی Educational Materials in other Languages Follow us: Facebook Twitter Youtube Blog Pinterest Instagram Search Menu Shop Donate Social Languages Accessibility About Us Friends Press Room Contact Us Shop Donate Reserve your Visit The Holocaust About the Holocaust The Holocaust Resource Center This Month in Holocaust History Video Lectures Video Testimony Resource Center The Middle East Conflict, Antisemitism and the Holocaust Digital Collections Shoah Names Database The Photo Archive Righteous Database The Documents Archive Survivor Testimonies Deportations Database The Artifacts Collection The Library Online Film Catalog Archives About the Archives Reference and Information Services Hall of Names Gathering the Fragments Research About the Institute Publications Yad Vashem Studies Events of the Intl Institute Projects Postdoc Fellowships Education & E-learning About Us Educational Materials Educational Videos For Educators in Jewish Frameworks Online Courses Seminars e-Newsletter International Projects International Conferences Languages Echoes & Reflections Museums The Holocaust History Museum The Art Museum Exhibitions Pavilion ready2print Exhibitions The Artifacts Collection Exhibitions Online Exhibitions Exhibitions Pavilion ready2print Exhibitions "Shoah"- Auschwitz-Birkenau Remembrance Holocaust Remembrance Day 2024 Holocaust Remembrance Day Through the Years Online Torchlighter Film Archive Int. 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Drive to Yad Vashem: For more Visiting Information click here About Us The Holocaust Digital Collections Archives Research Education Museum Exhibitions Remembrance Righteous Visiting Friends Press Room Contact Us Home The Holocaust About the Holocaust The Fate of the Jews Across Europe Murder of the Jews of Poland Murder of the Jews of Poland About the HolocaustNazi Germany and the Jews 1933-1939 The Outbreak of World War II and Anti-Jewish Policy The Ghettos The Beginning of the Final Solution The Implementation of the Final Solution The World of the Camps Combat and Resistance Rescue The Fate of the Jews Across EuropeMurder of the Jews of Poland Murder of the Jews of Western Europe Murder of the Jews of the Balkans and Slovakia Murder of Hungarian Jewry The Final Stages of the War and the Aftermath The Holocaust Resource Center Video Testimonies Resource Center Video Lecture Series FAQs The Eichmann Trial This Month in Holocaust History The Middle East Conflict, Antisemitism and the Holocaust On the eve of the German occupation of Poland in 1939, 3.3 million Jews lived there. At the end of the war, approximately 380,000 Polish Jews remained alive, the rest having been murdered, mostly in the ghettos and the six death camps: Chelmo, Belzec, Sobibor, Treblinka, Majdanek and Auschwitz-Birkenau. Read More... Photos Testimonies Video Lectures Artifacts Documents Lodz, Poland, Deportation from the ghetto in the summer of 1944 Yad Vashem Photo Archives, 7317/7362 Meir Brand: Holocaust Survivor and Israeli Combat Officer The Liquidation of the Ghetto in Trzebinia, Poland Dr. Ulrich Frisse: The German Judiciary in Eastern Galicia and its Contribution to the Holocaust Leg chains that fettered Jewish prisoners at the Chelmno death camp The leg chains were donated by Shimon Srebrenik, one of the three survivors of the camp. Yad Vashem Artifacts CollectionDonated by Shimon Srebrenik, Nes Ziona, Israel Items belonging to individuals murdered at the Chelmno death camp, which were buried by the Nazis under the ruins when the camp was liquidated in an effort to eliminate all evidence of the murder that had taken place there Chelmno was the first death camp used for mass murder by gas.  Approximately 320,000 Jews were murdered at Chelmno.  The victims’ belongings were found in excavations carried out by the director of the site in Poland in the 1990s.    Yad Vashem Artifacts CollectionLoaned by Muzeum Bylego Obozu Zaglady Chelmno nad Nerem, Poland Canisters containing Zyklon B, the poisonous gas used for mass murder in the death camps The gas arrived at the camps in solid form, in sealed metal canisters.  Contact with air turns the crystals to fatal gas that asphyxiates within minutes. Someone wearing a gas mask would pour the crystals through a small opening into the sealed gas chamber filled with victims. Yad Vashem Artifacts CollectionLoaned by Państwowe Muzeum na Majdanku, Poland Bunks used by the inmates of Auschwitz Yad Vashem Artifacts CollectionLoaned by Panstwowe Muzeum Auschwitz-Birkenau, Oswiecim, Poland Announcement of the Evacuation of the Jews from the Warsaw Ghetto, July 22, 1942 The Last Letter From Szmul Zygielbojm, The Bund Representative With The Polish National Council In Exile From the Final Report by Katzmann, Commander of the SS and Police in the District Of Galicia, On "The Solution of the Jewish Problem" in Galicia From Notes Made by Kurt Gerstein, An Engineer Working for the SS, on the Extermination Camp At Belzec Extract From Written Evidence of Rudolf Hoss, Commander of the Auschwitz Extermination Camp Jews lived in Poland for 800 years before the Nazi occupation. On the eve of the occupation 3.3 million Jews lived in Poland – more than any other country in Europe. Their percentage among the general population – about 10% – was also the highest in Europe. After the conquest of Poland by Germany and the Soviet Union in September 1939, most of the Jews remaining within the area occupied by Germany – approximately 1.8 million – were imprisoned in ghettos. In June 1941, after the German invasion of the Soviet Union, the Germans began to imprison the rest of Polish Jewry in ghettos and to deport them to concentration and slave labor camps. In December 1941 the murder of the Jews from the Lodz ghetto began in Chelmno with gas vans. Murder of Polish Jews in Auschwitz began in March 1942. After the basic guidelines for action were formulated at the Wannsee Conference, between March and July 1942 the Germans established three death camps in Poland (Operation Reinhard) close to main rail lines: Belzec, Sobibor and Treblinka. With the arrival of the deportation trains, the victims – men, women, and children – were sent straight to their deaths in the gas chambers. On July 22, 1942, on the eve of the Ninth of Av in the Jewish calendar, the Germans began the mass deportations from the Warsaw ghetto. By the time they ended on September 21, Yom Kippur, some 265,000 inhabitants of the ghetto had been deported to the Treblinka extermination camp. Approximately 1,700,000 Jews, primarily from Poland, were murdered in Belzec, Sobibor, and Treblinka by the end of 1943. Between September 1942 and the summer of 1944 tens of thousands of Jews, most from Poland, were murdered in Majdanek, outside of Lublin. In the summer of 1944 the remaining 80,000 Jews from the Lodz ghetto were deported to be murdered. Most were sent to Auschwitz-Birkenau, while some were sent to the Chelmno murder site, which was reopened for this purpose. Approximately 300,000 Jews were murdered in Chelmno, mostly from Poland. The murders in Auschwitz and Chelmno continued until the Red Army liberated the camps in January 1945. At the end of the war, approximately 380,000 Polish Jews were still alive in Poland, the Soviet Union, or in the concentration camps in Germany, Austria and the Czech territories. Online Store Nazi Europe and the Final Solution $45.00 Buy Now Online Exhibitions The History of the Dąbrowa Górnicza Jewish Community, Poland The History of the Chelm Jewish Community, Poland The History of the Nadwórna Jewish Community, Poland The History of the Nieśwież Jewish Community, Poland The History of the Szydlowiec Jewish Community, Poland Yad Vashem Har Hazikaron P.O.B. 3477 Jerusalem 9103401 Israel Phone: (972) 2 6443400 Fax: (972) 2 6443569 Email: [email protected] x Subscription for e-Newsletter Thank you for registering to receive information from Yad Vashem. You will receive periodic updates regarding recent events, publications and new initiatives. 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