Chełm's Unraveling: The Holocaust and Interethnic Violence in Nazi-Occupied Poland
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Published:2022
Issue:3
Volume:81
Page:653-676
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ISSN:0037-6779
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Container-title:Slavic Review
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language:en
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Short-container-title:Slavic rev.
Abstract
This article explores the myriad ways that Polish and Ukrainian residents engaged in violent and cruel behavior during World War II through a case study of the Chełm region. Under Nazi occupation, this formerly peaceful community exploded into a horrific scene of nationalist and popular violence. Jews were widely assaulted by their Polish and Ukrainian countrymen; Poles and Ukrainians engaged in mutual killings and ethnic cleansing; rural villagers were subjected to countless raids from area partisans; and escaped Soviet POWs were often denounced or otherwise attacked by area residents. Treating this outbreak as a whole, I argue that anti-Jewish violence was embedded in a vicious social transformation that engendered an array of crimes against multiple groups. By interweaving the fates of different ethnicities into a single study, my paper contextualizes Polish complicity during the Holocaust and highlights the sordid interactions between the German invaders, Jewish citizens, and local Christian society.
Publisher
Cambridge University Press (CUP)
Subject
Arts and Humanities (miscellaneous),Cultural Studies