Belsk brothers. My brother Daniel Craig. Why Hollywood made a film about four Belarusian Jews

Original taken from yevmen in "Jewish partisans" did not measure in their unfounded anger and robberies

The film "Challenge", released in Polish film distribution by director Edward Zwick, has caused a wave of indignation in this country, according to the British newspaper "Guardian". The Poles were offended by the heroic image of some four Bielski brothers who fled from the Nazi-occupied Polish territory, and then organized a Jewish gang on the territory of modern Belarus.

Today it is known that this gang participated in the attack on the village of Naliboki, as a result of which 128 civilians, including children, were brutally killed by Jews, houses were burnt and almost 100 cows and 70 horses were stolen.

For example, the conservative newspaper "Rzecpospolita" in an article dedicated to the release of the painting by Edward Zwick, reports that the Jewish gangs during the war years were not particularly shy about funds when they came to villages for food. "Very often these visits were accompanied by murders and rapes.", - quoted by The Guardian.

Likewise, I greeted with indignation the information about the premiere of E. Zwick's film and the most popular newspapers in Poland - Gazeta Wyborcza (which, by the way, adheres to liberal views- let's say on the issue of the Ukrainian-Polish conflict of 1942-44) and the conservative Rzeczpospolita.

The eldest of the brothers, Tuvia, the leader of the Jewish organized criminal group, is called by the newspaper a "cross between a bandit and a hero," and the more liberal newspaper Gazeta Wyborcza, although it does not mention the guilt of Belsky in the attack on Naliboki, describes the commander of the detachment as an alcoholic, sadist and rapist.

When the Germans occupied the territory of Belarus, the Belsky brothers (Tuvia, Asael, Zus and Aaron) went into the forest. In the forest around the quartet, Jews who fled from the ghettos of Novogrudok and Lida united. Together they founded a camp that they called "Forest Jerusalem". By the summer of 1944, there were about 1200 people in it. This was the so-called "family camp". The Belsky gang was autonomous in its activities and did not pay attention to the fight against the Nazis, concentrating on self-preservation in the "Forest Jerusalem" and robbing local residents. In the materials devoted to the activities of the detachment, it is repeatedly emphasized that, according to the Belsky brothers, it was more important for them "to save one Jew than to kill ten German soldiers." Shortly after the war, the "partisan" Tuvia left to liberate Israel, and from there in 1954 he moved to the United States.

The negative assessment of the Bielski detachment dominates in the modern Polish media. So, in particular, the newspaper "Nash Dzennik", referring to the results of the investigation of the Institute of National Remembrance, claims that this unit, together with Soviet partisans, took part in the destruction of peaceful Poles in the town of Naliboki. (zhykhary Nalibok was not a palyakam, this is a Belarusian enichnaya terytoria and there lived only Belarusians - IBGK) Researcher of the massacre in Naliboki Leszek Zhebrowski, who is quoted by this publication, claims that the Bielski detachment practically did not act against the Germans, but was engaged in robbing the surrounding villages and kidnapping girls.

L. Zhebrovsky emphasizes that terrible things happened in the Belsky camp, it came to murders, a kind of harem was created from young girls. Recognizing that the detachment's goal was to survive, the historian notes that even after recognizing the supremacy of the command of the Soviet partisan movement over themselves, the Belskys did not intensify the anti-German struggle.

"Our Dzennik" claims that as a result of requisitions from the local population, the Belsky detachment accumulated significant supplies of food, its soldiers did not deny themselves anything, meat was a daily food. At the same time, the Polish communist Jozef Markhwinsky is cited, who was married to a Jewish woman, and was seconded by the Soviet command to the Bielski detachment. He described those times in the following way: “Belskikh had four brothers, tall and prominent guys, so it is not surprising that they had the sympathy of the girls in the camp. They were heroes in terms of drinking and love, but did not want to fight. The oldest of them (camp commander) Tevye Belsky led not only all the Jews in the camp, but also a rather large and attractive "harem" - like King Saud in Saudi Arabia... In a camp where Jewish families often went to bed with empty stomachs, where mothers pressed their hungry children to their sunken cheeks, where they prayed for an extra spoonful of warm food for their little ones - a different life flourished in this camp, there was a different, rich world! "

Among other accusations in today's Polish press against the Bielski brothers, first of all - Tevye - misappropriation of gold and valuables given by Jews who lived in the camp for the purchase of weapons.

Another delicate moment is the participation of the soldiers of the Belsky brothers' detachment in the clashes between the Home Army and Soviet partisans on the side of the latter in the second half of 1943. But this is already a topic for another conversation. Let us only note that "Our Dzennik" also pointed out that on August 26, 1943, a group of fighters from the Belsky detachment, together with other Soviet partisans, destroyed about 50 AK fighters, led by Lieutenant Anthony Burzhinsky - "Kmicits". In May 1944, another clash between the Belsky detachment and the AK fighters took place - six Akovites were killed, the rest retreated.

According to the data of "Belorusskaya Gazeta" already in the fall of 1942. The Belsky detachment began military activities: together with neighboring partisan detachments, several attacks were made on cars, gendarmerie posts and railway patrols, a sawmill at Novoelnya station and eight agricultural estates were burned. In January, February, May and August 1943. the Germans undertook punitive operations to destroy the camp. So on January 5, 1943, two groups from the Belsky detachment were discovered and shot. On this day, Tevye's wife Sonya died. But thanks to the skillful actions and exceptional ingenuity of the commander, most of the inhabitants of the forest camp were saved every time.

In the final report of T. Belsky's detachment, it was noted that the soldiers of his detachment derailed 6 echelons, blew up 20 railway and highway bridges, 800 meters of railway tracks, destroyed 16 vehicles, and killed 261 German soldiers and officers. At the same time, the Polish historian from the INP Piotr Gontarchik argues that “Most of the battles in which the Jewish units took part were completely sucked out of thin air. 90 percent of the actions, which were later described as fighting the Germans, were in fact attacks on the civilian population. "

The main goal that the residents of Jewish family camps had was to survive. This explains the slight anti-German activity. Jewish researchers also admit this. So the Polish newspaper "Rzeczpospolita" quotes prof. N. Tets:

“I remember speaking with Tevye two weeks before his death. She asked why he decided on this heroic action? “I knew what the Germans were doing,” he replied. - I wanted to be different. Instead of killing, I wanted to save ”. He didn’t fight the Germans, it’s true. Because he believed that "one saved Jewish old woman is more important than 10 killed Germans."

This principle can be summed up in other words: “One Jewish old woman is more important than 10 Soviet soldiers". Or like this: "One old Jewish woman is more important than one hungry Polish child from whom we took food." The strategy of the Jewish gangs was simple: you fight, while we will rob the local population on the sidelines.

The relationship between Jewish bandits and local civilians is one of the most difficult and painful pages in WWII history in CEE. The Belsky squad is no exception. One of the Jewish media put it this way:

"Residents nearby villages cooperated with the Jews, because they quickly learned that the Belskys were more dangerous for them than the Nazis. The guerrillas did not hesitate to destroy informers and collaborators. One day, a local peasant handed over to the Nazis a group of Jews who came to ask him for food. The partisans killed the peasant himself, his family and burned down his house. "

According to the memoirs of Leonid Okun, who escaped from the Minsk ghetto at the age of 12 and lived in another family Jewish camp, “Belsky was definitely feared. Belsky's detachment had "sharp teeth" and selected thugs guys, Polish Jews, who were not distinguished by excessive sentimentality. "

It was the Jewish gangs that the Polish underground especially strongly accused of requisitions and robberies of Polish civilians. Incl. one of the conditions in the negotiations with the Soviet side, put forward by the Poles, was to limit the activities of Jewish gangs. So, at the first meeting of the officers of the Novogrudok district of the AK with the commanders of the Lenin partisan brigade on June 8, 1943, the Akovites demanded that Jewish gangs should not be sent on requisition:

"... do not send Jews, they grab weapons at their own discretion, rape girls and small children ... insult the local population, threaten further revenge on the Soviet side, have no measure in their unfounded anger and robberies."

In the reports of the Delegation of Zhonda (the underground Polish civil administration), it was said about the events in the former Novogrudok Voivodeship:

“The local population is exhausted by constant requisitions, and often by robbery of clothing, food and equipment. Most often this is done, mainly in relation to the Poles, the so-called. family detachments, consisting exclusively of Jews and Jewish women. "

AK also took food from people, as did the Soviet partisans. It was an army and they had to eat to fight. However, the Jewish bandits were not an army, they did not fight the Germans, they thought only about their salvation, and at the same time, they acted especially cruelly during their expropriation actions. “Killing a man is like smoking a cigarette,” recalled later about those times, one of the soldiers of the Bielski detachment Itske Reznik.

The Poles openly disliked Jews - they could not forgive them for cooperation with the Soviet regime during the occupation in 1939-41. (In the memoirs of former residents of Nalibok about September 1939, Jews with red armbands on their sleeves, who joined the Soviet militia, invariably appear).

After the war, Tevye and Zus moved with their families to Poland, and from there to Palestine. They settled on the outskirts of Tel Aviv in Holon and worked as drivers. According to some reports, the elder brother took part in the war with the Arabs in 1948, he was even considered missing for some time. Tevye later immigrated to New York, where he worked until the end of his life as a taxi driver (according to other sources - a truck driver) and died in 1987 at the age of 81. A year later, Tevye Belsky was reburied with military honors at the Heroes' Cemetery on Mount Herzl in Jerusalem. Zus also moved to the United States, where over time he founded a small transport company, died 1995

In 2007, a scandal erupted around the youngest of the Belsky brothers - 80-year-old Aaron, now living under the name of Aaron Bell. He and his 60-year-old Polish wife Henrika were arrested in the United States on charges of kidnapping and taking possession of other people's property. According to the investigation, the situation was like this: the couple brought their neighbor to Palm Beach, Florida, 93-year-old Yanina Zanevskaya, who only wanted to look at her homeland, and deceived her left in a private nursing home. They paid for her stay there (about a thousand dollars a month), called several times, but did not take her back to the States. In addition, they illegally withdrawn $ 250,000 from Zanevskaya's account as her legal guardians (inheritance from wealthy husbands). All this dragged on for 90 years in prison. According to the Polish Gazeta Wyborcza, last summer, Aron and his wife were under house arrest. More recent news about this case could not be found.

The script of the film "Challenge" is based on the book of the researcher of the "Holocaust" of a certain Nehama Tek, a Jew who allegedly miraculously escaped in Poland during the war, posing as a Catholic Pole.

It should be noted that Jewish gangs on the territory of the western part of modern Belarus were really active during the Great Patriotic War... Usually they tried to avoid clashes with local partisans, be they Soviet saboteurs or anti-communists from the Polish Home Army. Not to mention the clashes with the Germans, which the Jews tried to avoid in every possible way. At the same time, it was the Jewish gangs that most actively robbed and killed Belarusian peasants. An example of this is the book "Blood and Ashes of Drazhno" by journalist and local historian Viktor Khursik, who described what happened in 1943. the destruction of a Belarusian village by a Jewish gang led by Israel Lapidus:

“We ran to the garden to save ourselves, and my mother returned to the house, wanted to take out something. The thatched roof of the hut was already on fire by that time. I lay there, did not move, my mother did not return for a long time. He turned, and her about ten people, even women, stabbed with bayonets, shouting: "Get it, you fascist bastard!" Saw her throat cut. - The old man paused again, his eyes were empty, it seemed that Nikolai Ivanovich was experiencing those terrible moments again. - Katya, my sister, jumped up, asked: "Do not shoot!", Took out a Komsomol ticket. Before the war, she was a pioneer leader, a staunch communist. During the occupation, she sewed her father's ticket and party certificate into her coat and carried it with her. But a tall partisan in leather boots and uniforms began to aim at Katya. I shouted: "Dzyadzechka, I'm not scolding my syastra!" But a shot rang out. My sister's coat was instantly bloody. She died in my arms. I will forever remember the face of the killer. I remember how I crawled away. I saw that the neighbor Fyokla Subtselnaya, together with her little daughter, was thrown alive by three partisans into the fire. Aunt Thekla held her baby in her arms. Further, at the door of the burning hut, lay the old woman Grinevichikha, burnt, covered in blood "...

In the area of ​​Derechin a gang was assembled under the command of Dr. I. Atlas, in the area of ​​Slonim - a detachment "Shchors 51"; in the Kopyl region, Jews who fled from the ghetto of Nesvizh and two other ghettos created the Zhukov gang, Jews from the Dyatlovo region - a gang under the command of Ts. Kaplinsky. Jews from the Bialystok ghetto and adjacent towns and cities created the Kadima Jewish gang and several other small gangs. From the Minsk ghetto alone, several thousand Jews fled into the forests, of which they united in 9 large gangs. In Poland in 1942-1944 there were 27 large Jewish gangs, in Lithuania there were originally 7 Jewish gangs. By the way, in September 1943, the head of the Central Headquarters of the partisan movement Panteleimon Ponomarenko, by a special directive, forbade the admission of fugitives from the ghetto to partisan detachments, since there were a large number of traitors and provocateurs among them.

A particular problem was created by the fact that the Jews had to feed themselves. They obtained their own food and clothing from the local population. During these supply operations, the Jews behaved like ordinary robbers, or so the population perceived it. They requisitioned lingerie, children's clothing, household belongings ...

The Germans turned a blind eye to these gangs - after all, they avoided active hostilities, so the Polish and Soviet partisans tried to solve the problem of Jewish looting.

On November 20, 1943, near the village of Dubniki, Ivenets district, a horse platoon of the Polish battalion No. 331 under the command of cornet Nurkevich (nicknamed Night) shot 10 "Soviet partisans" from Sholom Zorin's detachment. Here are their names: Zyama Axelrod, Israel Zager, Zyama Ozersky, Leonid Openheim, Mikhail Plavchik, Efim Raskin, Chaim Sagalchik, Leonid Fishkin, Grigory Charno, Sholom Sholkov. (In 1965, their ashes were reburied in Ivenets). What happened was this: on the night of November 18, in the village of Sovkovshchizna, Ivenets district, Jews took food from the peasants for their gang. One of the peasants complained to Nurkevich that “the Jews are robbing”. Soldiers of the Home Army (AK) surrounded the bandits and opened fire, after which they took 6 horses and 4 carts away from them. The looters were disarmed and shot.

We will quote the document - Order No. 116 of the commander of the AK, General Bur-Komorovsky, dated September 15, 1943:

“Well-armed gangs wander aimlessly through towns and villages, attacking estates, banks, trade and industrial enterprises, houses and farms. The robberies are often accompanied by murders, which are committed by Soviet partisans hiding in the forests, or simply by robbery gangs. Men and women, especially Jewish women, take part in the attacks.<…>I have already issued an order to local commanders, if necessary, to use weapons against these robbers and revolutionary bandits. "

According to Jewish sources, most of the Jews were in the forests and swamps of Belarus - about 30 thousand. The number of underground Jews in Ukraine exceeded 25 thousand. Another 2 thousand Jews numbered in the literal sense of the word gangs operating in the Baltic States. As you can see, the number of Jews "partisans" on the territory of the USSR numbered 5 divisions, but they distinguished themselves in causing significant damage to local residents, and by no means to the Germans.

According to modern researchers, 47 Jews commanded partisan / bandit units in Belarus alone. Let's name some names ...

Isaak Aronovich Zeifman, a lieutenant of the Red Workers 'and Peasants' Army, although the partisans knew him under the name Ivan Andreevich Grinyuk, now lives in the United States in New York.

Arkady Grigorievich Lekhtman, also a glorious commander of a partisan detachment in Belarus, but known under the name Volkov, now he says that he knew 47 more glorious red partisan commanders in Belarus who helped to carry out the line of Comrade Stalin.

Efim Korentsvit, lieutenant of the Red Army, also helped the peasants in Belarus, he was also the commander of the partisans, the detachment, although later he was entrusted more, he was dropped by parachute into the Tatras in 1944, where he organized the partisan Soviet Slovak movement, and then in Kiev he helped the Ukrainians to get rid of national patriotism carrying out the ideas of Lenin and Stalin in life, this executioner is known under the name of Yevgeny Volyansky

Joseph Lazarevich Vogel, also a commander and also accidentally surrounded, known as Ivan Lavrentievich Ptitsyn, according to documents, led the red partisans-avengers from the "Assault" brigade

Aba Kovner, the glorious red commander of partisan detachments, in 1943 united the glorious Red Jewish detachments: commanders Shmuel Kaplinsky, Yakov Prener and Abram Resel, their Avenger squad should still be remembered not by the fascist monsters who seized the Soviet land, but by the irresponsible Belarusian peasants. Comrade Aba Kovner reached Berlin, where in the fall of 1945 he led the "Brigade of Jewish Avengers" (DIN) on the territory of defeated Germany, identifying and destroying the Nazis and their accomplices involved in the genocide of the Jewish people, about 400 such executioners were killed without trial and investigation , but by the end of 1945, the British, wanting to stop the too scandalous atrocities of the Soviet hero, the executioner caught Abu .. Arab fascism. This fiery warrior died in 1987 ...

Evgeny Finkelstein. known under the name Miranovich, his detachment did not allow the Nazis to sleep, on his account - 7 destroyed garrisons, 12 blown up trains, in how many civilians and burnt villages - then they have no account - therefore, Comrade Finkelstein received from the Communist Party of the Bolsheviks the star of Hero of the USSR ...

Shalom Zorin, also a glorious Jewish commander, originally from Minsk, left Israel in 1971.

Iehezkel Atlas, born in Poland, a doctor, but after the attack on Germany on Poland fled to the USSR, when Germany attacked the USSR, Comrade Atlas organized a Jewish partisan detachment and this glorious Jewish avenger died in battle in the summer of 1942, his glorious deeds are remembered in the cities of Derechin, Kozlovshchina, Ruda-Yavorskaya;

Sholem Sandweiss, his 500-strong Jewish detachment named after Kaganovich was created from the fugitive prisoners of the ghettos of Baranovichi, Pinsk, Brest and Kobrin, these were desperate Jews, they did not put their lives and others' lives in a penny and went willingly at any risk and even certain death, but almost no one was killed, although their victims among the civilian population can tell a lot, but who is asking now.

Aron Aronovich, commander of the "Struggle" detachment, it is difficult to say with whom he fought and why he worked out the awards, but undoubtedly his memory did not fade away in the burned down villages with the peasants, although it was a long time ago, a lot has been erased, now they think more about Coca-Cola and about Lukashenka, of course, too.

Hero of Russia (this title was awarded to him relatively recently) Yuri Kolesnikov, in fact, Chaim Toivovich Goldstein, was the commander of a special sabotage detachment in Belarus.

Commander Nikolai Nikitin is actually Beines Mendelevich Steinhardt.

Commander Nikolai Konstantinovich Kupriyanov is actually Kogan.

Commander Yuri Semenovich Kutsin is actually Yehuda Solomonovich.

Commander Philip Philipovich Kapusta is also a Jew.

The commander of the Kutuzov detachment, the murderer of the civilian population Israel Lapidus, escaped from the Minsk ghetto.

The commander of the Zharkov Jewish partisan detachment, Sholom Khalyavsky, together with other Jews fled from the Nesvizh ghetto.

The commander of the "Old Man" brigade Boris Grigorievich Experienced and the brigade commander Semyon Ganzenko are also Jews.

Jewish commander David Ilyich Fedotov operated in the Mogilev region.

The commander of the detachment named after Dmitry Pozharsky, Jew Arkady Isaakovich Kolupaev

Commander Dmitry Petrovich Levin

Massacre in Naliboki

Before the war of 1939, approx. 3 thousand (according to other sources - about 4 thousand) inhabitants, of which about 90% were Roman Catholics. Also, 25 Jewish families lived here (according to some Polish sources - several hundred people). At the beginning of the occupation, a post of the Belarusian collaboration police was located in the town. In the middle of 1942 it was liquidated and, with the permission of the German authorities, a Polish self-defense group was legally established in Naliboki. According to Polish sources, this self-defense was secretly controlled by the AK, there was an unspoken non-aggression agreement with the Soviet partisans.

In early May 1943, partisans attacked the town. It is alleged that detachments commanded by Rafal Vasilevich and Pavel Gulevich took part in the attack. In addition, in the attack and killings of peaceful Poles, according to the INP (his Lodz unit began an investigation into this case back in 2001 at the request of the Congress of Poles in Canada) and other Polish historians, partisans of the Bielski detachment also took part. The attackers grabbed mostly men, who were shot; some of the local residents were burned in their own homes. Also among the dead were a 10-year-old child and 3 women. In addition, local farms were robbed - food, horses, cows were taken away, most of the houses were burned. The church, post office and sawmill were also burnt down. According to the Polish side, more than 130 people were killed in total.

INP investigators interviewed approx. 70 witnesses. INP prosecutor Anna Galkevich, who is in charge of the case, said last year that the investigation was coming to an end. Most likely, the case will be dropped due to the death of the suspected mass murder.

The same "Our Dzennik" also published an interview with Vaclav Novitsky, a former resident of Nalibok and a witness to the events on the night of May 8-9, 1943 (he was then 18 years old). According to him, Jews from the Belsky squad were definitely among the attackers. In particular, he heard them speaking in Hebrew (obviously Yiddish), and his grandfather recognized several of the local Jews among the attackers. According to V. Novitsky, there could have been much more victims among the Poles, if not for Major Vasilevich, who protected them from Jewish partisans. At the same time, V. Novitsky accused INP of rejecting his testimony. At the same time, back in 2003, in a public speech, the INP procurator A. Galkevich stated that “among the attackers there were also Jewish partisans from the detachment under the command of Tevye Belsky. The witnesses named the names of the partisans who took part in the attack known to them, indicating that among them there were also women and residents of Nalibok of Jewish nationality. " As V. Novitsky pointed out, the attack took place at about 5 o'clock in the morning, they attacked approx. 120-150 Soviet partisans. His fellow villager Vaclav Khilitsky describes it as follows: “We walked directly, broke into houses. Everyone they met was killed in cold blood. Spared no one. "

Polish sources also claim that the attack on the town was led by its former Jewish residents, who were commanded in the Bielski camp by Israel Kesler, who was a professional thief before the war. The brothers Itsek and Boris Rubezhevsky also belonged to this group. The wife of the latter, Zulia Volozhinskaya-Rubin, in her memoirs published in 1980 in Israel, and also voiced in a documentary film in 1993, claimed that the attack on an unnamed Polish village, as a result of which approx. 130 people (the number coincides with the number of victims in Naliboki), was initiated by her husband out of revenge for the attacks of local residents on Jews who escaped from the ghetto, and on Jewish partisans, in particular for the murder of the Rubezhevskys' father. Is this so? .. Add to this information that Kesler was killed by T. Belsky for attempting to seize power over the camp (according to other sources, Kesler was executed by a camp court sentence for trying to destroy the detachment).

There will never be a consensus on the issue of the Belsky brothers' gang and similar formations. For some, they will always be heroes, despite the hard-hitting information, for others, they will always be villains, regardless of the conditions and circumstances of those times. For some, Tevye Belsky will always be associated with a saved Jewish old woman, for others with 130 residents of Nalibok burnt alive ...

The New York Museum of Jewish Heritage hosted a very unusual screening of a new feature film, Defiance. Director - Oscar Winner Edward Zwick... Starring - Daniel Craig and Liev Schreiber... And the unusual viewing was that there were participants in the events shown in the film in the hall.

1941th year. Western Belarus. The Nazis, with the help of local policemen, are killing Jews. The Belsky brothers are hiding in the forest. Others are joining them. This is how the Belsky Jewish partisan detachment was formed.

Families of the heroes of the film and veterans of the Jewish partisan movement came to the museum for viewing. From them I learned that brothers Tuvia and Zyus Belsky, who led the detachment, survived. Immediately after the war, they moved first to Romania, and from there to Palestine. Then, in 1956, to America. They lived in Brooklyn, in the Midwood area. Like other expats learning English, they worked hard to support their families. Tuvia became a truck driver. He died in 1987. He was buried on Long Island. And later the ashes were taken to Israel and buried a second time, but with all the honors. His brother Suss managed to make some money in America and bought a gas station on Kent Street under Williamsburg Bridge in Brooklyn. Then he bought a medallion in a taxi and rented it out. He died in 1995.

University of Connecticut sociologist professor Nehama Tes has published a book called Challenge: Belskie Partisans. But even after this book, memorial plaques did not appear on the houses where the Belskys lived in Brooklyn. Only in a small Holocaust memorial park in Sheepshead Bay is there a stone in memory of Tuvia Belsky. Even Tuvia's family did not know about this stone for a long time. But the memory of the brothers is kept by those whom they saved, as well as the children and grandchildren of the saved.

Tuvia Belsky's son 48 years old Michael Belsky, says:

I visited Belarus last year. I went to Novogrudek, Lida, Minsk, Molodechno. But first of all, of course, in Stankevichi. We went there to see where our family was from. The father's parents had their own farm there with a mill. And 12 children ... We crossed almost all of Belarus.

Have you met any of your relatives or those who remember your parents?

Yes, we met a man who lived next door to my father's family. He is the last in Stankevichi who remembered the Belsky brothers. He is 82 years old. As a boy, he played with my father and with my father's brothers. He showed us where the Belskys' house stood, where there was a mill, and told us in detail what happened in this place. And then, in Novogrudok, we were shown the place where 4 thousand Jews were killed, and among them are my father's parents, many of his brothers and sisters, the wife and daughter of uncle Zyus.

You are, of course, proud of your father. But don't you think that the fame and recognition of his merits came to him too late? It would be nice to bring flowers alive ...

It does not upset me that the glory was late, because from childhood I knew the history of my father and the whole family. It doesn't matter to me if the world knows what my father was, it is more important for me that my children know about him and tell their children about it ... I want my children and grandchildren to know that Jews did not go to death like sheep, that they resisted and survived, and that families were reborn and the lineage continued. Today, there are 15 thousand descendants of partisans from the Bielski detachment.

Another witness and participant in the events:

I have been in Belsky's detachment, but I am not from his detachment. I was, as it were, over Belsky. My name is Semyon Lapidus... I was the commander of a partisan detachment that was part of the Chkalov brigade. Before the war, I studied in Suvorov School in Bobruisk ...

Anne Monka lives in New Jersey:

I was the youngest in Belsky's detachment. I was 13. I sang, danced and entertained our partisans when they were resting. And this Suvorovite - Semyon Lapidus - was sometimes my dancing partner. I didn’t shoot: they didn’t give me a weapon. Considered a child. There were many children there.

What songs did you sing to the partisans then?

In Yiddish, of course. And in Russian - "Katyusha ..."

And then she sang, so fervently, as if she was still 13 ...

And my name is Leia Friedberg... I flew to this meeting from Florida. My husband's name was Peisakh Friedberg. In August 1942, he was one of the first to escape from the Novogrudok ghetto to the Belsky detachment. Then together with him in the detachment there were only 17 people. And then he returned to the ghetto and brought out a whole group, which included me, a 15-year-old. There were 29 people with us in the detachment. Then the detachment began to grow, and when there were 1200 people there, the detachment began to be called a brigade. By the Belsky brigade ...

Anne Monka:

My dugout was just across the street from Leah Friedberg's dugout. We built these dugouts with our own hands. They chopped down trees, dug the ground, made a roof.

But that was not the worst thing. Worse, when German planes appeared over us and dropped bombs on us.

But no one was afraid of them. The desire to survive in spite of the Nazis was so great that we were ready to endure anything. And we survived thanks to the Belsky brothers. They survived and were able to get to free America, raise children here. And today is probably one of the most important days in our life, because the Belsky brothers are finally recognized as Jewish heroes. Better late than never. It happened during our lifetime, when we can confirm that it was all. I am happy that with the release of the film, the whole world will witness the heroism of the Jews, and will see that the Jews are not sheep, obediently going to the slaughterhouse, into pits and ovens. The Jews found a way to save themselves and others.

On the other hand, this is a very sad day for me. Because the real heroes who did everything to protect us, save us from death, are not with us today ...

Son of Zyus Belsky, Zvi Belsky, 47 years old, told us:

I think Liev Schreiber played my father very well. My father was what Schreiber showed him: very aggressive, hot-tempered. He believed that in order to save yourself and others, you need to arm yourself. We must arm everyone, even teenagers and children. Naturally, at first the brothers wanted to save themselves. Dad told me that first my uncle Tuvya, uncle Asael and Zus, my father went to the forest. Then they tried to save as many people as possible. And, of course, they wanted to avenge the death of their parents, for the first wife and child of my father. The brothers knew who did it - the local policemen. Father finished them ...

During the filming of this film, I flew to Lithuania ... Suddenly I see Lev Schreiber coming out of the forest in boots and a cap. I recognized him as my father. A shiver came over me. I could not calm down ... You know, my father killed quite a lot of people: Germans, policemen ... And I once asked him if he regretted it? He replied that his greatest regret was that he could not save more Jews.

Some critics accuse Zwig of portraying Jews as being too cruel. Almost terrorists ...

And what was the father to do with those who killed his wife and child, his parents, his brothers and sisters? He wanted revenge. What should have been done with the Nazis, who then killed 8-10 thousand people a day? They only killed because they were Jews. I can only repeat what my father said. He regretted not only that he could not save more Jews, but also that he could not kill more Nazis.

Former members of the Jewish partisan movement led by the Belsky brothers were photographed for memory with the director of the film "Challenge" Edward Zwick... After the photo shoot, the famous director told me:

It's one thing to make a film about people, and it's another thing to meet them in life, those whom you wanted to show. I am amazed at their love of life, their energy. Here, indeed, people are strong in spirit. They really wanted their story to be told. And this dream came true.

Daughter of Tuvia Belsky, Sonya, a tall brunette of indescribable beauty, said that she was all like her father:

The Belsky brothers were tall, strong, handsome, they loved to drink and fight. They were characters! .. When they entered, they occupied the entire space. It was impossible to take your eyes off them. They were not bandits, robbers. They passionately loved life and did everything to survive. And they tried to save as many Jews as possible. In the partisan detachment, they set up a field hospital, a synagogue, a school, a bathhouse and a bakery. By the summer of 44, when the Germans were expelled from Belarus, the detachment had 1250 people. During the entire existence of the detachment, only 50 people died. The story is alive as long as it is told ...

Before you start watching a movie Robert Belsky, the son of Tuvia, took the stage:

My father was not looking for fame, recognition. For him, the greatest happiness was to see those whom he saved, to see the Jews alive. And the fact that you are all gathered here is his reward.

Then he said in Yiddish: "Partizanen zainen doo!" and began to name the former partisans by their last names. Families got up on command ...

The director, anticipating the show, said:

From today on, this story ceases to be mine, yours. She goes into the world. Working on this film changed my life.

When, after watching, I asked the audience if the colors were too thick, they answered: "It's all true."

They owned a water mill and were successful farmers and entrepreneurs. They were the only Jewish family in the village. They observed Jewish traditions and were on good terms with their neighbors.

David and Beila Belsky had 9 sons and two daughters. Whenever possible, a visiting teacher was invited to the children, and then they were sent to schools in neighboring cities. The eldest son, Tuvia, graduated from Jewish and Polish schools; knew Russian, Belarusian, Polish, Yiddish and Hebrew. Thanks to German soldiers during the occupation of 1915-18. I also learned German. V Polish army rose to the rank of non-commissioned officer. He was a Zionist activist. By September 1939, he was the owner of the store. Asael ran the family mill. Zus, an activist of Beitar, got married in 1939.

The Soviet authorities took away the shop and the mill. Asael and Zus were drafted into the Red Army. When the mass deportations of “alien elements” to Siberia began, Tuvia Belsky, fearing arrest, got a job as an accountant in Lida. There he divorced his wife and met another woman, whom he later married.

Righteous Among the Nations Konstantin Kozlovsky.

At the beginning of the Nazi occupation

After the German occupation, Asael and Zus, who left the encirclement, were forced to hide with neighbors and in the forest, not far from their parents' farm. Two younger Belskys, Yakov and Abram, were shot by the Germans. Tuvia, disguised as a peasant, was hiding in the vicinity of Lida, where his wife Sonya remained in the ghetto.

In December 1941, the younger Belsky, 12-year-old Aron, returning from the forest after meeting with his brothers, saw a Nazi van carrying his parents away. He managed to warn the older brothers who, from another farm, took Toibe's sister, her husband, child and mother-in-law into the forest.

On December 7, Belsky's parents, Tuvia's ex-wife Rivka, as well as Tsilya, Zusya's wife, and her newborn daughter were shot along with 4,000 other local Jews.

After many months of wandering Tuvia, Asael, Zus and Aron gathered all the surviving relatives in the forest. In June 1942 Tuvia took his wife Sonya and her family out of the Lida ghetto. Later they infiltrated neighboring ghettos and took out more distant relatives. They urged friends, neighbors, and then all Jews to flee the ghetto and join them.

At first, the group consisted of 30 people with several pistols.

Detachment Belsky

By the early spring of 1942, they managed to form a partisan detachment. The brothers became commanders. The main of them was Tuvya, Asael was his deputy, Zus was the head of intelligence. Aron, the younger brother, was a liaison with the ghetto, other partisan groups and the local population. Beitarian Lazar Malbin, who had a good education and military experience in the Polish army.

The detachment joined the Soviet partisans (with whom they were not always good relationship), who tried to control the territory and were not formally against the Jews. Tuvia Belsky established himself as a decisive and experienced commander and gained a certain prestige among the partisans.

In August 1942, they managed to establish contact with the Novogrudok ghetto and organize the transfer of people from there to a detachment, which grew from 80 people to 250. In the fall of 1942, the Belsky detachment began military activities: together with neighboring detachments, they made several attacks on cars, gendarmerie posts and railway siding, burned a sawmill at Novoelnya station and 8 agricultural estates.

In the spring of 1943, due to the fugitives from the Lida ghetto, the Belsky detachment grew to 750 people and was allocated to a separate partisan detachment of the Kirov brigade.

The combat wing of the detachment - over 100 people under the command of Zusya Belsky - successfully participated in battles with German troops during anti-partisan operations, the detachment's demolitions derailed German trains, burned and blew up bridges, damaged communication lines. Belsky's demolitionists were generally considered aces of sabotage and enjoyed great respect and authority in the partisan environment.

In general, when compared with other partisan formations, the combat activity of the Belsky detachment was not very significant. It was created not so much for war as for the survival of the Jews ("Better to save one Jew than kill ten German soldiers"). The peculiarity of the Belsky detachment was that it was replenished exclusively at the expense of the Jews who fled from the ghettos of Lida and Novogrudok. Unlike other partisan detachments, they accepted all Jews - old people, women, children, who were sent to the family camp. Jews fled to them from the ghetto and other partisan units- because of anti-Semitism.

In total, the detachment gathered about 1200 people. Their camp was nicknamed Jerusalem in the forest.

The Germans were actively looking for the Belsky detachment. They left them, maneuvering through the forest. From 1942 to 1943, the squad was constantly on the move to avoid detection, and was never safe. Tuvia's wife Sonya was killed in one of the first Nazi attacks. Good knowledge of the area and communication with the local population allowed Belsky to avoid clashes with the Germans. When at the end of 1943 the detachment grew to 400 people, they established a more permanent base in the Stara Guta area.

A few months later, moving away from the massive German offensive (Operation German), the camp moved to the swampy ridge Krasnaya Gorka in Nalibokskaya Pushcha, in a swampy, barely accessible area on the right bank of the Neman River, east of Lida and northeast of Novogrudok. After a week of sitting on the island, when the Germans left, the camp was moved to a more habitable place in the middle of the forest. Under the name "Partisan detachment them. Kalinin ”detachment Belsky was based there until the liberation of Belarus. I had to divide the detachment into a combat group and a "family camp".

Partisans from the Belsky detachment.

First of all, the Belskys had to protect the detachment from internal strife, so as not to let it fall apart. The Belskys demanded complete submission from their partisans. The group was far from a "utopian society of enlightened democratic and egalitarian government," and was forced to take extreme measures in order to eliminate divisions and ensure the survival of the detachment as a whole. On at least one occasion, Zus Belsky shot one of his officers for leaving civilians behind in the movement of his group. When leaving the forest on July 10, 1944, one of the partisans was shot for disobeying the order to leave heavy personal belongings in the camp.

Life in the forest was very difficult. Women cared about survival and sometimes had lovers in order to have personal protectors and earners. There were very few children; it was customary to have abortions in case of pregnancy, since it was impossible to take care of babies. In order not to attract the attention of German aircraft, fires were kept to a minimum and people suffered from cold and dampness. Despite this, almost no one in the family camp died of illness. Even the typhus epidemic caught from the Russian partisans was suppressed, although there was no medicine.

The detachment was located on a group of hills. There were long camouflaged sleeping dugouts, a large kitchen, a mill, a bakery, baths, two medical posts, a tannery, a synagogue, a school, prison and theater. Tailors, shoemakers, watchmakers, carpenters, locksmiths and gunsmiths provided the 1,200 members of the community with the necessities, and about 60 cows and 30 horses provided food and transport. The detachment has established economic cooperation with the Soviet partisans. They even held weddings there under the guidance of a rabbi.

In March 1944, the inhabitants of the family camp of the Belsky detachment collected and donated to the country's defense fund 5321 rubles, 1,356 German marks, 45 dollars, more than 250 gold and silver coins, about 2 kg of gold and silver scrap.

The combat-ready members of the detachment were primarily engaged in the production of food. They were also engaged in sabotage, the destruction of those who turned over Jews to the Nazis, and German officials. Many others, including women, the elderly, and the disabled, were supported and protected by society, although it was difficult to move with them. The detachment sent groups to infiltrate the ghetto and help in escaping from there.

The captured Germans were killed because they could not be held captive.

During the occupation, the detachment survived more than one blockade. In January, February, May and August 1943, the Germans launched punitive operations to destroy the camp. But the commander managed to save people every time with minimal losses. In the area of ​​operation of the Bielski detachment, the Nazis deployed a group of 20 thousand soldiers. For the head of Tuvia Belsky, a reward of 100 thousand Reichsmarks was announced. The strongest German attack occurred during their retreat on July 9, 1944.

In the memoranda to the leaders of the underground regional committees, it was noted:

When in 1943 a group of 100 people fled from the concentration camp in Koldishevo and went to the Belskikh detachment, Soviet partisans from the Cherkasy detachment robbed them on the way.

To interact with the Soviet partisans, the Belskys had to pretend to be sufficiently communists and not show their adherence to Jewish traditions. The first hostilities against the Nazis in the Novogrudok area were carried out together with a detachment under the command of Viktor Panchenko. The Soviet command several times tried to absorb the Belsky detachment, but they resisted. The Belskys did not demand anything from the Soviet command and were quite independent.

The detachment remained a separate unit under the command of Tuvia, which allowed it to protect the non-fighting Jews. The Belskys had practically no material support from the mainland: for the entire period of its existence, the detachment received "2 (two) machine guns, 2500 cartridges, 32 grenades and 45 kg of tolu". In the Bielski detachment, armed fighters accounted for less than a quarter of the total number of people. The commanders of other partisan detachments believed that the Belskys should get rid of the “family camp” that had grown excessively, in their opinion, and intensify their sabotage and military activities.

In February 1943, the Belsky detachment was included in the partisan detachment "October" of the Lenin brigade. In the detachment there was a coordinator - a Soviet officer who had been transferred from the "mainland", Sinichkin. After organizing a permanent base, the detachment formally turned into two detachments: them. Kalinin - a family camp under the command of Tuvia and them. Ordzhonikidze - a combat group under the command of Zusya - as part of the partisan brigade named after. Kirov.

He interacted with a partisan formation in Nalibokskaya Pushcha, commanded by "General Platon" (Secretary of the Baranovichi Underground Party Committee, Major General Vasily Efimovich Chernyshev, 1908-1969). Tuvya Belsky later recalled the visit of "Platon" to the detachment. He showed him a gunsmith making parts for a rifle, an empty prison, a tannery where soles for boots and other leather items were made, a bakery, a sausage factory, a grocery store that held a supply of bread and meat for three days and crackers - two kilograms each. person. The general was brought to the soap factory, and he asked to supply the headquarters with soap. They showed a kosher slaughterhouse, a mill and a tar factory (for leather production). The general asked if they made vodka. After visiting the Belskikh detachment, Chernyshev stopped all talk about the liquidation of the "family camp".

Relations with the local population

Belsky considered it necessary to act extremely tough in order to survive. Collaborators who had collaborated with the German authorities were executed after a short trial. At first, in 1941-42, local peasants often passed information about the Belsky detachment to the Germans. Once a local peasant handed over to the Germans a group of Jews who came to ask him for food. The partisans killed him along with his entire family and burned down his house. Several such reprisals against informers forced the peasants to cooperate with the partisans, and not with the Germans.

In Nalibokskaya Pushcha, the Polish organization of the local village self-defense "Ahova", associated with the Home Army, was actively operating. The local population was extremely anti-Soviet and anti-Semitic. "Ahova" fought with Soviet partisans. Soldiers of the Home Army mercilessly destroyed the Jews who fell into their hands. For example, in the fall of 1943, such a fate befell the partisans from Zorin's detachment. In May 1944, the Belsky detachment clashed with the Akovites - six of them were killed, the rest retreated.

Local peasants preferred to inform the Germans about the partisans, so as not to give food. Food was taken from them by force, using weapons (like other detachments of Soviet partisans). In the history of the detachment, Tuvia Belsky notes:

True, according to Belsky,

Tuvya has established good relations with part of the local population. Food and other necessary things were also taken from villages destroyed by Nazi punishers or left empty after the population was taken to work in Germany.

After the overthrow of the communist regime, the Polish authorities consider the actions of the partisans to be robbery and looting.

On March 8, 1943, in the village of Naliboki, Soviet partisans killed 128 people, including women and children, for refusing to provide food. Polish anti-Semites, including the left-liberal ones from Gazeta Wyborcza, accused the Bielski detachment of this. Historians believe that the detachment arrived in the Nalibok area not earlier than August 1943; Tuvia Belsky's son Robert also asserts this.

After the war

On July 10, 1944, the Belsky brothers took about 1270 Jews out of the forest. During the existence of the detachment, about 50 people died - unusual low level losses for partisan detachments. Tuvya Belsky gave each of his people a certificate of participation in a partisan detachment. Many of them tried to return home, but found their homes destroyed or occupied.

Few of the survivors were willing to stay in the Soviet Union. As Polish citizens, they had the right not to join the Red Army if they had the appropriate job, and could immediately leave for Poland. Many have moved to the United States, Israel and Western Europe.

Tuvya and Zus got a job in Lida, not wanting to continue their cooperation with the Soviet government. They submitted to the authorities a report on the actions of the detachment during the period of the occupation. Both got married again.

Asael did not want to be exempted from the draft, although he only got married and went to fight in the Red Army together with a combat detachment. He was killed in February 1945 near Marienbad, East Prussia. His widow Haya came to Israel through Poland. In 1980, the Beit Jabotinsky Partisan Museum in Tel Aviv hosted a memorial ceremony for Asael, at which his daughter Asaela lit a memorial candle.

In December 1944, Tuvia and Zus with their wives and Aron moved to Poland, and from there to Israel. They fought in the War of Independence.

Tuvya Belsky became a taxi driver. In 1955 Tuvya and Zus with their families and Aron left for the United States, where one of their younger brothers lived, who managed to get rich. They settled in Brooklyn. Tuvia drove a truck in New York; he owned two trucks by the end of his career. He died in 1987. Tuvue Belsky was buried in the Jewish cemetery in Long Island, but a year later, at the insistence of the association of guerrillas, underground fighters and participants in the ghetto uprisings, he was reburied with military honors in Jerusalem

Zus became the owner of several taxis. He died in 1995. Their children and grandchildren live in the USA.

Several of Belsky's grandchildren live in Israel. For example, Matt Belsky, the grandson of Zusya, served at TsAGAL and went to study at Bar-Ilan University. His father used to come to Israel to fight in the Yom Kippur War. Matt's brother and sister came to Israel from the USA.

Memory of Belsky and their detachment

In September 1944 Tuvya compiled a detailed report for the Belarusian Headquarters of the Partisan Movement (BSHPD), which is now kept in the National Archives of Belarus. The partisans of the Bielski detachment and other detachments that operated in Belarus during the war years left their memories.

In 1946, Tuvia and Zusya's book "Forest Jews" ("טוביה וזוס בלסקי" יהודי יער) was published in Israel. She was not very popular, and in Israel no one was interested in the exploits of the partisans.

The official reference book "Partisan formations of Belarus during the Second World War", published by the Institute of Party History in 1983, does not say anything about the Belsky brothers or their detachment.

In 1993, University of Connecticut professor of sociology Nechama Tec published Defiance. The Bielski Partisans "(Resistance. Bielski Partisans; New York, Oxford University Press, 1994, ISBN 9780195093902). It is on the basis of this book that the script of a film shot in Lithuania was written. The book is based primarily on the recollections of members of the Bielski detachment, as well as their relatives.

In 2000, Ruth Yafe-Radina's book Escape to the Forest: Based on real story Holocaust (Radin, Ruth Yaffe. Escape to the Forest: Based on a True Story of the Holocaust. New York: HarperCollins Publishers, 2000).

In 2001, the daughter of Asael Belsky published a book about her father and the Belsky detachment.

In 2003, American journalist Peter Duffy published The Bielski Brothers with the long subtitle “ True story three men who fought the Nazis, built a village in the forest and rescued 1,200 Jews. ”(Peter Duffy. The Bielski Brothers: The True Story of Three Men, Who Defied the Nazis, Saved 1,200 Jews and Built a Village in the Forest; New York : HarperCollins Publishers, 2003, ISBN 0-06-621074-7). Duffy's book is based mainly on archival materials, including Belarusian ones.

In 2004, James M. Jewish Resistance during the Holocaust: Moral Uses of Violence and Will. Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire; New York: Palgrave Macmillan was published. , 2004).

Have been filmed documentaries about the Belsky detachment:

In 2008, the American war drama "Defiance" (English "challenge, resistance") was released on the cinema screens.

Materials about the Belsky detachment are exhibited in the Yad Vashem museums, the Washington Holocaust Memorial Museum and its branch in St. Petersburg (Florida).

see also

Sources and links

• based on materials (English). JewishPartisans channel, youtube (4 Feb 2015). Retrieved May 16, 2016.

One of the most dark spots in the history of the Belsky detachment is the mass execution of civilians in the village of Naliboki on May 8, 1943. But, judging by the archival materials and memories of people who were in the Jewish camp, the detachment could not participate in the execution ...

Partisans in Nalibokskaya Pushcha

The theme of the Jewish partisan detachment of the Belsky brothers became very popular after the release of the Hollywood film "Challenge", where the role of the main character - Tuvia Belsky - was played by Daniel Craig. However, the history of the partisan detachment of the Belsky brothers to this day has many "pitfalls" and dark spots, which are increasingly attracting attention.

The problem of the relationship of Jewish partisans with the local population is a fertile topic for speculation, given the number of opposing poles that intertwined the West Belarusian territory during the war years.

It should be noted that, with the exception of memories, there is little information on this topic. It is very difficult to assess the activities of the Jewish partisan detachment throughout the entire period of its existence. In modern Polish media, a negative assessment of Bielski and their soldiers dominates: the latter are accused of violence and cruel treatment of the local Polish population. In turn, in the books of Nehamia Tek “Challenge. Partisans Belsky ”and Peter Duffy, who collected archival materials and documentary information in the USA, Israel and Belarus, described a lot of negative attitude of the population towards Jewish partisans.

Before the war and at the beginning

The roots of hostility towards Jews must be sought, probably, even before the creation of a partisan detachment, and in general - before the war.

The population of Western Belarus often had a negative attitude towards Jews. The ruling circles of the Polish state and the Catholic Church provoked Polish-Jewish contradictions due to the wide participation of Jews in revolutionary activity parties and forces of the left, in particular the checkpoint, KPZB and others. After the annexation of Western Belarus in September 1939, economic difficulties aroused the discontent of the peasantry, which blamed all the troubles, of course, on the Jews.

In the reports drawn up by the command of the Red Army in 1939-1940 following the results of political intelligence, enmity between Poles and Jews was noted. During the campaign for the elections to the Supreme Soviet of the USSR and the BSSR, the Polish population declared that "according to the law of God, you cannot vote for the Jews nominated as candidates for deputies."

With the arrival of the Nazis, Jews were generally in desperate situation... After the establishment of the occupation administration, the organization of the ghetto and the first shootings in July-December 1941, the brothers Tuvia, Zus and Asael Belsky felt this on themselves when, not without the help of local residents, their parents, two younger brothers, a sister, a wife were arrested and killed. and newborn daughter Zusya.

Another, younger brother Aaron managed to escape into the forest. The sister's daughter managed to be given up for adoption into a Polish family, the rest were placed with friends in different villages of the Novogrudok district. Some people later paid for it with their lives.

In such circumstances, the confrontation between "friend" and "alien" was introduced into the consciousness of people, every minute of their existence was accompanied by inhuman tension and fear for the fate of relatives, loved ones and their own lives.

Squad: Beginning

The Belsky brothers survived the first winter, spending the night in the barns of the inhabitants of the surrounding villages, from time to time meeting and discussing the situation. Tuvia Belsky managed to get into the Lida ghetto and get his wife Sonya and her family out of there. In the spring of 1942, they managed to move to the Bachkovitsky forest, where the first small camp was organized for twenty of the closest relatives whom Belsky managed to find. In fact, in the period from July 1941 to the spring of 1942, the brothers gathered together as many close relatives and friends as possible in order to increase the chances of survival, find a suitable place, and hide from the police and German punishers.

Belsky brothers

The population treated Belskiy differently: there were people who reported about the group to the police chiefs. However, there were also those who warned the brothers about the danger.

The brothers acquired the first few rifles together with the partisans commanded by Vladimir Gromov. The detachment consisted mainly of encircled Red Army men and had practically no ammunition. The Belsky brothers showed the partisans the house of the policeman Kuzminsky, who had a small stock of ammunition. Belsky, together with several partisans, seized Kuzminsky in the evening, when he and his family were getting ready for dinner. They took all the weapons in the house, and Kuzminsky himself was taken to the forest, to the rest of Gromov's partisans, where he was executed.

After the second Jewish pogrom in Novogrudok in early August 1942, a group led by Konstantin Kozlovsky, a Belarusian, a friend of Tuvia Belsky from the pre-war times, joined Belsky. Kozlovsky sincerely sympathized with the Jews and was ready to help, at the risk of leaving five children orphans. Moreover, he offered his home and help not only to Belsky, but also to all those who dare to escape from the ghetto.

Survival

It is quite understandable why Tuvia Belsky declared the salvation of Jews to be the main task of the detachment.

All combat-ready under the leadership of Peisach Friedberg were sent to Novogradok to organize the first major escapes of prisoners from the ghetto. By the end of August 1942, the detachment had grown to 80 people - precisely at the expense of those Jews who managed to escape.

One of the main problems for the detachment, of course, was food, which was sorely lacking. The peasants were very reluctant to share it, often Belsky had to take food by force, which, of course, exacerbated relations with the local population. The traditional antagonism "peasants - partisans" was mingled with national contradictions. There have been cases of denunciation local residents about the escaped Jews and about the whereabouts of the Bielski detachment to the police chiefs and the German administration.

Partisans from the Belsky detachment

With the onset of cold weather, the Belsky brothers decided to organize two small winter bases near the Stankevichi - in the forests of Lipchanskaya Pushcha. After the German blockade in December 1942, the detachment was forced to retreat to the Khrapenevsky forests. On the way, it was very difficult for people: they had to sleep on practically bare ground; some of the soldiers, tired of the difficulties associated with providing for women, children and the elderly, were on the verge of a psychological breakdown.

A week later, two groups were sent on reconnaissance to the remaining dugouts in Perelazy and Zabelov. The rest of the detachment remained in their new location. Twelve people took refuge near the village of Khrapenevo, in two peasant huts. At noon on January 5, 1943, local policemen and German soldiers in camouflage coats approached the village. As a result of the battle, 9 people from the Belsky detachment were killed, including the wife of Tuva Belsky - Sonya.

The most important problem was still the procurement of food, which the partisans sometimes had to take from the peasants, intimidating them and threatening them with reprisals, which, in turn, provoked the peasants to denounce the police.

During one of the expeditions to buy food, a small group went to the village of Dobroe Pole, where two members of the group - Abram and Ruben Polonsky - had acquaintances: the Belous family. They lived in a large house with their families - only eighteen people. Belous accepted the partisans, but the Polonskys did not know that the son of Vladimir Belous, Nikolai, was a policeman in Novogradka and stained himself with participation in numerous massacres of Jews. Tired after the campaign, the partisans settled in a warm house and soon fell asleep. Then the son of Vladimir Belous, Pavel, ran to Novogradok, found Nicholas and told about the Jews who settled in Dobroe Pole. An hour later, a motorized convoy, in which there were about fifty policemen, entered the village. The partisans tried to escape, but did not have time - nine out of ten people were killed by heavy fire.

The Belskikh camp learned about this only a few weeks later. Asael Belsky gathered a group of thirty people and arrived in the village on the evening of Friday 23 April 1943. The partisans surrounded the Belous house, broke into it and killed everyone they found, and then set the house on fire. On that day, ten people from the Belous family were killed.

Forced cruelty

As Tuvia Belsky himself recalled, they were merciless towards traitors and policemen. They had to intimidate the population of the surrounding villages - they had to understand that they would lose their lives if they reported to the Germans on the "family detachment".

It is difficult to say how justified such a tactic was. The motives that guided those from among the civilian population who collaborated with the occupation authorities were probably not based on hatred of Jews as a people. I had to go to great lengths on pain of death.

Another thing is how their actions were presented in the eyes of the Jews, who had been driven to despair for several years of the German occupation.

In turn, the Germans brutally dealt with those who were accused of helping Jews. In the winter of 1943, the Nazis killed the Bobrovskys for organizing the escape of the ghetto prisoners. They were shot, the house was burned down, and six children were sent to a concentration camp. At the same time, the younger brother of Konstantin Kozlovsky, Ivan, was killed. To help Jews escape from the ghetto, he got a job with the police in Novogradok, was a liaison between the ghetto and the Belsky brothers.

A separate topic is the relationship of the Jewish partisans of the Belsky detachment with the Soviet partisans operating in Western Belarus. In most cases, they were based on mutual cooperation between the leaders of the detachments. Together with Panchenkov's detachment and other partisans of the Kirov brigade, Jewish partisans carried out a number of sabotage.

In the summer of 1943, in the Belsky camp in Nalibokskaya Pushcha, clothes were sewn for Soviet partisans, shoes and weapons were repaired, and so on.

However, some researchers testify that cooperation between the Jewish group and its Soviet comrades has not always been successful. There were cases when groups of Jewish bombers were disarmed by Soviet partisans. So, one night in the village of Mostishche, Novogradsky district, partisans of Voroshilov's detachment disarmed 7 Jews from Belsky's detachment. Two days later, partisans of Furmanov's brigade of Chapaev detained Belskikh's wagon train and took 21 bags of grain, 4 wild boars, 2 cows, 4 horses and all personal belongings. Once the commander of the Dzerzhinsky brigade Shashkin with his partisans did not let a group of Tuva Belsky fighters to the bridge over the Neman, took away horses and carts.

Jewish partisans

Leonid Okun, a former prisoner of the Minsk ghetto, a scout of the partisan detachment No. 106, led by Semyon Zorin, describes Belsky's relations with other partisans differently: “Belsky's demolitionists were considered aces of sabotage and enjoyed great respect and authority among the partisan community. None of the "local" partisans risked getting involved with Belsky's detachment, because the Jewish detachment did not forgive anyone, and could, if necessary, instantly put half a thousand ruthless fighters under arms and engage in battle with any Soviet brigade, at the slightest hint of an aggressive attack to your address.

The commissars in Belsky's detachment were just a part of the generally accepted "decoration", and nothing more. And although Tuvia Belsky knew how to maintain good and even relations with all the partisans in the district, they were afraid of him ... The detachment had "sharp teeth" - selected young thugs, Polish Jews, who were not distinguished by excessive sentimentality. So one or another gang of "green" or even guerrillas operating in the forests had to think carefully before robbing or killing someone. Examples of how the Belsky partisans "brought up" their "forest neighbors" are well preserved in my memory. The Belskys had a goal - to save the Jewish civilian population, and their detachment swept away on its way everyone who somehow interfered with doing it. "

It is not known what Okun wanted to emphasize, because information about any major conflicts between the Belsky detachment and neighboring partisan formations has not been preserved.

Relations with the Home Army were difficult for the Bielski detachment in the last year before the liberation of Belarus. And to a large extent this was due to the decree of the Central Committee of the CP (b) B of June 22, 1943 "On measures for the further development of the partisan movement in the western regions of Belarus." A letter “On military-political tasks in the western regions of Belarus” was circulated to all the underground regional committees. It defined the main criteria that were to be guided by the Komsomol and party organizations in relation to Polish nationalists: "The existence of various organizations, which were ruled by the Polish bourgeois centers, must be interpreted as illegal interference in the affairs of our state." Nationalist detachments and groups, the letter emphasized, must be isolated from the population by creating Soviet detachments and groups of workers of Polish nationality. Further, it was recommended "to expose and dissolve nationalist detachments and groups by all means."

Were Belskys in Naliboki?

One of the darkest spots in the history of the Bielski detachment is the mass execution of civilians in the village of Naliboki. Some Polish researchers blame Jewish partisans for organizing it.

On May 8, 1943, as a result of an attack by Soviet partisans on Naliboki, 128 people died. The attackers grabbed mostly men and shot them; some of the residents were burned to death in their own homes. Among the dead are a 10-year-old child and three women. In addition, local farms were robbed: the attackers took away food, horses, cows, and burned most of the houses. The church, post office and sawmill were also burnt down.

Tuvia Belsky in the Polish Army, 1920s

In 2001, the Institute of National Remembrance of Poland (INP) began an investigation into the events of May 1943 in Naliboki. In a number of Polish sources the main reason The attack on the village described the intention of the command of the Soviet partisans to eliminate the Polish self-defense, the garrison of which was formed by the Germans in mid-1942. According to some reports, the self-defense was secretly controlled by the AK. It is alleged that partisans of the Dzerzhinsky, Bolshevik, Suvorov detachments, commanded by Major Rafal Vasilevich and the commander of the Stalin brigade Pavel Gulevich, took part in the attack. According to the INP and some Polish historians, partisans of the Bielski detachment also took part in the killings of peaceful Poles.

The Polish newspaper Nash Dziennik published an interview with Vaclav Novitsky, a former resident of Nalibok and a witness to the events on the night of May 8-9, 1943. According to him, Jews from the Belsky squad were definitely among the attackers. As Novitsky showed, the attack took place at about 5 o'clock in the morning, about 120-150 Soviet partisans attacked. His fellow villager Vaclav Khilitsky describes it as follows: “We walked directly, broke into houses. Everyone they met was killed, no one was spared. "

But whether the Belsky detachment participated in this pogrom is an open question. Judging by the archival materials and memories of people who were in the Jewish camp, the detachment of the Belsky brothers could not participate in the execution of civilians on May 8, 1943, since they arrived in Naliboki only in June.

Another interesting fact: Polish sources claim that the attack on Naliboki was led by their former Jewish residents, one of whom was Israel Kessler.

One is not a detachment yet

Israel Kessler was indeed one of the partisans of the Bielski detachment. And not the best. From the very beginning, he was in the ranks of those dissatisfied with the fact that all power in the detachment was concentrated in the hands of the Belsky. From the moment the detachment was redeployed to Naliboki, Kessler began to write denunciations against Belskikh addressed to Sokolov, an assistant to General Chernyshev (commander of the Baranovichi department of the BSHPD). Jack Kagan in his memoirs described Kessler as follows: "He was a troublemaker who clearly saw himself in the place of the squad leader."

According to one of the versions present in Peter Duffy's book "The Belsky Brothers", based on the memoirs of former Jewish partisans, Israel Kessler was a thief before the war and even sat in prison. After the German blockade in July-August 1943, soldiers from the Bielski detachment noticed that Kessler was searching peasant houses in search of valuables. One of them said: “Kessler has taken up the old again. The thief, who was in prison before the war and barely knew how to write his name in block letters, became simply insubordinate in the forest. "

Once Kessler left the squad without permission, which was strictly forbidden. When he returned, he showed Tuvia Belsky a certificate from Sokolov: allegedly he was at the brigade headquarters on "official business". Kessler refused to explain in what cases. Head of a special department internal security Solomon Volkovyssky went to the partisan headquarters, where he was shown a letter signed by Kessler and his supporters, which stated that the Belskys did not enforce the party line and were more concerned about personal enrichment than the welfare of the camp population.

Upon learning of this, Asael Belsky, without waiting for clarification of the circumstances and without giving Kessler a word, took out a pistol and shot him. One of Kessler's allies was accused of helping the Germans and was also shot.

The History of the Kalinin Partisan Detachment, written by Tuvia Belsky, notes that "two partisans in the detachment were shot for looting among the local population." Unfortunately, it is impossible to say whether this concerns Kessler.

Survival or resistance?

There is also an opinion that the detachment of the Belsky brothers was aimed specifically at the survival of the Jews and did not fight the Nazis. Here it can be called completely erroneous. According to Doctor of Historical Sciences David Melzar, the detachment “derailed 6 enemy trains going to the front, blew up 20 railway and highway bridges, conducted 12 open battles and ambushes, destroyed 16 vehicles with manpower, and in total - more than 250 German soldiers and officers ". Zus Belsky personally killed 47 Nazis and collaborators. For the head of Tuvia Belsky, the Germans appointed a reward of 100 thousand Reichsmarks - they simply do not appoint a reward.

BROTHERSBELSKIE

Ilya Kuksin

In August 2003, a book titled "The Bielski Brothers" was published by 34-year-old New York journalist Peter Duffy. The book is subtitled "The True Story of Three Men Who Defeated the Nazis, Saved 1200 Jews, and Built a Village in the Forest."

In the official history of the partisan movement in Belarus during the Second World War, both in Soviet Belarus and in the now independent Republic of Belarus, not a word is said about the three Belsky brothers, who not only made a significant contribution to the fight against the German invaders, but also saved over a thousand doomed to die. Only the archives have preserved documents about their unparalleled struggle against the invaders. These three brothers (Tuvya, Asael and Zus) saved as many Jews as the world famous Oskar Schindler. Led by the eldest of the brothers, the partisan detachment in the battles with the invaders destroyed almost as many enemies as the heroes of the uprising in the Warsaw ghetto. For many years, materials about their exploits were mentioned only in a few books published outside the USSR. Who would let in the former USSR to write about the heroic deeds of the Jews who left for Israel after the war.

Peter Duffy once on the Internet came across a mention of the so-called Forest Jews. He became interested and discovered that the descendants of these heroes live in Brooklyn not far from him. Interviews with them and the aged veterans of the Belsky detachment, published and unpublished memoirs, materials from the Belarusian archives and the Yad Vashem archive in Israel formed the basis of this most interesting book.

Asael

The book begins with the history of the Belsky family, whose ancestors settled in the small village of Stankevichi in the 19th century, located between the cities of Lida and Novogrudok not far from the famous Nalibokskaya Pushcha.

During the First World War, they survived the German occupation, then their area was ceded to independent Poland. In the fall of 1939, after the partition of Poland between Stalin and Hitler, Bielski became citizens of the USSR.

Zus

Tuvya Belsky was born in 1906. After the German attack on the USSR, Tuvya did not obey German laws, did not register, wearing a yellow six-pointed star. When the executions of the Jewish population began, Tuvya and his two brothers went into the woods. Father, mother and younger sister were shot by the Germans. The 12-year-old Aron narrowly escaped execution and soon joined the elders. The Belsky brothers were hiding when the Gestapo Einsatzkommando arrived in the area to "finally resolve the Jewish question" (under this euphemism the Nazis concealed the complete extermination of the Jewish population). The brothers began to make their way into the ghettos of Lida, Novogrudok and other cities and towns, urging them to flee from them. So gradually a detachment was born from a small group of several dozen people, which began to fight the Nazis.

Tuvia

Tuvya considered his main task to save as many Jews as possible. Having organized the escape of a large group of prisoners from the Lida ghetto, he addressed them with the following words: “Friends, this is one of the most happy days in my life. These are the moments I live for - look how many people managed to get out of the ghetto! I cannot guarantee you anything. We are trying to survive, but we can all die. And we will try to save as many lives as possible. We accept everyone and do not refuse anyone, neither the elderly, nor children, nor women. Many dangers lie in wait for us, but if we are destined to die, at least we will die as people. " Tuvia's detachment joined the general partisan movement in the occupied territory. Only a quarter of the detachment consisted of armed fighters. Most of them were women, old people and children. When the secretary of the Baranovichi Underground Party Committee, Chernyshev, visited this family camp, he saw well-equipped and camouflaged underground dugouts, in which not only people lived, but also various workshops were located: shoemakers, tailors, weapons, tanneries, and an underground hospital. The camp contained 60 cows, 30 horses, its people were not only self-sufficient, but also helped others. The partisan detachment of the Belsky brothers successfully participated in battles with German troops during anti-partisan operations, the detachment's demolitions derailed German trains, burned and blew up bridges, damaged communication lines. When the Germans decided to destroy the detachment, about which there were already legends, about a thousand people moved into the depths of the forest on a small island among the marshes. They walked in silence, even the children did not cry. Dense forests on this island they were completely sheltered from aviation. In the morning the Germans reached the deserted camp, followed the fugitives and, approaching the swamp, tried to pass it, but could not. For three days they stood around this swamp, trying to find passages to the island, and then left the forest.

The squad is preparing for battle. 1943 g.

In the summer of 1944, as a result of Operation Bagration, the German group in Belarus was surrounded and defeated. And in July 1944, the neighboring residents were surprised to see how Tuvia Belsky's detachment, which stretched for almost a kilometer, appeared from the depths of the forest. Its ethnic composition left no doubts. And this was after German propaganda asserted that Belarus was "Judenfrei", that is, it was completely cleared of Jews. Soon Tuvue was summoned to Minsk, where he compiled a full report on the activities of his detachment. Peter Duffy found this report in the archives of the Republic of Belarus and quotes the most significant parts of it in the book. After the war, the brothers and their families went to Poland. But the hostile attitude of the population forced them to move to Palestine. In the mid-50s, Tuvya and Zus with their families, as well as Aron, moved to the United States. They settled in Brooklyn, and Tuvya became a truck driver, the second brother, Zus, became the owner of several taxis. Shortly before Tuvia's death, in the summer of 1986, the people he saved rented a luxurious banquet hall at the Hilton Hotel in New York. When 80-year-old Tuvya Belsky appeared in front of the audience, 600 people stood up as if on command and greeted him with thunderous applause. One by one, people went up to the podium and talked about Tuvia's heroic deeds. He died in December 1986. Tuvia Belsky was buried in the Jewish cemetery in Long Island, but a year later, at the insistence of the association of partisans, underground fighters and participants in ghetto uprisings, he was reburied with military honors in Jerusalem at the cemetery where the most famous heroes of the Jewish Resistance are buried.

Tuvia Belsky's partisan detachment.

1944 g.

Zus died in 1995. Aron now lives in Miami.

Peter Duffy's book is not the only publication dedicated to the Belsky brothers. Ten years ago, Nehama Tek, a professor of sociology at the University of Connecticut, published Defiance. The Bielski Partisans ". And if Duffy's book is mainly based on documentary data, then Nehama Tek's book is based on the memoirs of members of this detachment and Belsky's relatives. Both books complement each other and revive the little-known story of the heroic resistance of the Jews during the Second World War. They are eloquent evidence that the Jews, placed in inhuman conditions, were not wordless, uncomplaining victims, they fought in partisan units in Nazi-occupied territory, led clandestine activities, rebelled in ghettos and German extermination camps. These books are a worthy monument to those who did not kneel before enemies and with arms in their hands defended their lives, honor and dignity, as well as to those who gave their lives to save others.

Tuvia Belsky's words, which Peter Duffy and the author of these lines cited as an epigraph, turned out to be prophetic. Unfortunately, the heroic deeds of the Belsky brothers received only posthumous fame.

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