During World War II, about a million and a half Jews fought in the Allied armies. Jews participated in fighting in allied armies. Between 30 and 40,000 Jews also fought in the partisan ranks and underground. About a quarter of a million Jewish fighters in the armies fell in battle. 200,000 Jewish soldiers from various Allied armies fell into German captivity. For Jewish prisoners of the Polish army mainly, a step-by-step murder policy was introduced, and for Jews from the Red Army, total and immediate murder took place.
The fighters represent Jewish resistance to Nazis during World War II.
Jews fought in World War II under the Red Army (former USSR), US armies, Poland, United Kingdom, Australia, New Zealand, Canada, France, Belgium, Netherlands, South Africa, Czechoslovakia, Greece, Yugoslavia. And also served as volunteers of the Jewish community in Israel as part of the British Army, and within the Jewish Brigade.
In the Red Army, Jews served in all positions and on all command avenues and many of them were decorated and many were killed. More than 100,000 Jewish prisoners of war from the Red Army were captured and almost none survived.
Many Jews who managed to flee Europe in the 1930s against the Nazi threat served in Western Allied armies during World War II, especially in the US and UK armies.
About 40,000 of the Jews of Palestine joined the British army (another source: 32,000 Jews), of which 5,000 were in an independent unit – the Jewish Brigade (“Jewish Fighting Brigade” – infantry). Of the Jewish soldiers from Palestine, 668 soldiers were killed. 100 soldiers Received decorations.
Approximately 30-40,000 Jewish fighters fought as part of anti-Nazi underground in ghettos and concentration camps in Europe and in Jewish and non-Jewish partisan units. All over occupied Europe, there were irregular organizations dealing with guerrilla fighting in the German occupation. Jews stood out in the USSR in existing partisan units or set up independent units. In Yugoslavia and Greece, Jews joined the general partisan war.
Jews also fought against Germans either in partisan organizations in forests, in local resistance groups, or in independent partisan frameworks.
The ghettos created underground organizations of Jews who did not initially turn to armed resistance against the Nazis because they were hopeless. When the Nazi extermination plans against Jews became known and during the extermination, groups of Jews began to organize for armed resistance. Despite the difficulties of organizing and retaining much of the Jews in this move for fear of exacerbating the attitude towards the Jews, a number of rebellious ghettos broke out against German rule. The great uprising occurred in the Warsaw ghetto. Even in the extermination camps, where prisoners who were forced to take part in the murder apparatus were organized, Jews revolted against the Nazis.
