ZUCKERMAN, Yitzhak "Antek"

Nationality: Israeli (originally Polish: immigrated to Israel after World War II). Born: 13 December 1915. Family: Married Zivia Lubetkin. Career: Active throughout the Nazi occupation of Poland in underground resistence activities including the Jewish Fighting Organization and Warsaw Ghetto Uprising. Editor, The Fighting Ghetto newsletter. Cofounder, Kibbutz Lohamei Haghetaot and Beit Lohamei Haghetaot (Ghetto Fighters' Kibbutz and Memorial). Died: 17 June 1981.

Publications

Memoirs

Ba-geto uva-mered. 1985.

Sheva' ha-shanim ha-hen: 1939-1946. 1990; as A Surplus of Memory: Chronicle of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising, 1993.

Other

Sefer Milhamot ha-geta'ot: Ben ha-homot, ba-mahanot, baye'arot, with Mosheh Basok. 1954.

Ketavim aharonim: 700-704, with Shelomo Even-Shoshan and Itzhak Katzenelson. 1956.

Kapitlen fun izovn, with Shmuel Barantchok and Re'uven Yatsiv. 1981.

*

Critical Studies:

"The Road Leads Far Away: A Surplus of Memory: Chronicle of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising by Yitzhak Zuckerman" by Irving Howe, in New Republic, 208 (18), 3 May 1993, p. 29; "Ghetto Fighter: Yitzhak Zuckerman and the Jewish Underground in Warsaw" by Michael R. Marrus, in American Scholar, 54(2), Spring 1995, p. 277.

* * *

Although Yitzhak Zuckerman was not a prolific writer on the Holocaust, his contribution to Holocaust remembrance is not to be overlooked. Zuckerman was an organizer of and a commander in the Żidowska Organizacja Bojowa (ŻOB; Jewish Fighting Organization), and his work offers Holocaust scholars invaluable insider information into an operation that was superbly organized but doomed to fail. This failure was not due to the fact that these fighters were young, middle-class, and inexperienced in battle; they were outnumbered in manpower and in weaponry. The spirit of the ghetto fighters, however, surpassed all comprehension that the Germans had of Jews. They had not suspected that a "non-resistant, weak people" would be capable of going up against a clearly more powerful Nazi army. Indeed, in spirit these ghetto fighters were the true victors, and their bravery is a tribute to the extraordinary potential that more often than not lies dormant in most people.

When studying the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising, one must also keep in mind that at this time the fighters had an extremely difficult time recruiting others in the ghetto to join their cause. Many knew it would be a fruitless effort; many others had already resigned themselves to the fact that the ghetto was the place they were supposed to be. Understanding the meaning of "ghetto mentality" is imperative in gaining an even stronger understanding of just what these young fighters were up against—not only the Nazis and the Judenrat, with its fair share of informants, but a resistance of the inhabitants to fight against what they perceived to be the fate that had been dealt to them.

Zuckerman's mainstay in his life was his wife, Zivia Lubetkin, who, even though a shy, middle-class woman from a small village, became a central figure in the organization of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising. Her work In the Days of Destruction and Death provides an overview to many others' contributions to the organization of the uprising and can be read in addition to Zuckerman's Surplus of Memory: Chronicle of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising. The Warsaw Ghetto Uprising is only a small section of the entire Holocaust experience, and it is many times passed over in favor of the "larger picture" of the Holocaust. But the significance of this resistance cannot be denied. As stated in the foreword of Surplus of Memory, simply entitled "Antek," Barbara Harshav states, " … in that Hell they [the fighters] lived in, they've maintained a human image. Because they stared down the reality of their situation directly in the face and took control of their own lives, holding onto their definition of who they were and what they valued—difficult enough in the best of circumstances; well-nigh impossible under Nazi occupation." Not many of the leaders of the uprising survived that nearly month-long period from 19 April to 16 May 1943, and among those killed was the leader of the ŻOB, Mordecai Anielewicz. Many of the fighters committed suicide rather than face what punishment the Nazis had in store for them. Zuckerman led many to safety out of the Warsaw Ghetto through the underground sewer system. He continued rescuing Jews during and after the war. In 1946, when massacres of great numbers of Jews in the town of Kielce commenced, Zuckerman and Lubetkin were there to lead survivors to safety.

Zuckerman was also the editor of a newsletter called The Fighting Ghetto. He and Zivia established the Kibbutz Lohamei Haghetaot (The Ghetto Fighters' Kibbutz), whose members are all Holocaust survivors. He continued paying tribute to the uprising by establishing a museum, Beit Katznelson, at his kibbutz. The 12 archives and more than 60,000 volumes and documents in the museum made its collection larger than that of the U.S. Holocaust Museum.

To the end of his life Zuckerman continued his tribute to the resistance of the Warsaw Ghetto fighters. He fervently worked in his kibbutz and maintained the Beit Katznelson for many years. The entire ordeal of his youthful days, however, had indeed taken a toll on his health. He died of a heart attack in Galilee on 17 June 1981.

—Cynthia A. Klima

See the essay on A Surplus of Memory: Chronicle of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising.