For first time, Poland marks deportation of Jews from Warsaw Ghetto

Poland will mark, for the first time in history, the deportation of Jews from Warsaw Ghetto. Events throughout the city will take place on Sunday to coincide with the date that, some seventy years ago, the Warsaw Ghetto was cleared out and gas chambers at the Treblinka extermination camp, where 900,000 people met their deaths, were activated.

The main event, a mass procession called “From Death to Life” will be dedicated to children who were sent to their deaths. Marchers will start off at the famous Umschlagplatz, where victims boarded trains to death camps and made their way to Janusz Korczak’s famous orphanage. Each participant will receive a colored ribbon bearing the name of a child murdered by the Nazis. Some participants will be able to write on their ribbon the name of a child they are familiar with – either personally or through literature.

On the same day a memorial will be held for Adam Czerniaków, the head of the Jewish council at the Warsaw Ghetto, who on July 22, 1942 committed suicide when he understood the scope of the exterminations. Even though the Warsaw Ghetto was cleared out in 1942 and Jews were transferred to Treblinka, it remained standing until it was destroyed in the Spring of 1943.

Read more: http://www.haaretz.com/jewish-world/jewish-world-news/for-first-time-poland-marks-deportion-of-jews-from-warsaw-ghetto-1.452592