On April 19, 1943, an armed uprising, led by Mordechaj Anielewicz, broke out in the Warsaw ghetto. After his suicide, Marek Edelman took command. It was the first urban uprising in German-occupied Europe. The uprising began on the day of the final liquidation of the ghetto ordered by Heinrich Himmler. At that time, few of its Jewish inhabitants, about 50,000-70,000, were left alive. Out of maximum number of 460,000 people, many died of starvation, diseases, were killed by the Germans or taken to death camps. Several hundred fighters from the Jewish Combat Organization (ŻOB) and the Jewish Military Union (ŻZW) took part in the uprising. It lasted until mid-May 1943. Due to the lack of a chance of success (a small amount of weapons, no help from outside the ghetto), the uprising had no military and strategic goals. The goal was purely ideological. It was an attempt to oppose the Nazi oppressors. A silent call to the world to draw its attention to the genocide that the Germans committed against the Jewish people.
The Warsaw Ghetto Uprising is regarded by Jews as one of the most important events in the history of their nation.
Every year, in tribute to the victims of the uprising, we lay flowers – daffodils, which have become a symbol reminding us of this tragic event. Daffodils identify the memory of all of us, collective memory. They carry a invaluable message and a warning to posterity to do everything possible so that this tragic history will never happen again.
“We have to teach in schools, kindergartens and universities that evil is evil, hatred is evil and that love is a duty. We must fight evil so that the one who does evil will understand that there will be no mercy for him.” – wrote Marek Edelman
This year, at the Treblinka Museum exhibition, daffodil pins are available for visitors as part of the “Daffodils 2022” campaign organized by the POLIN Museum of the History of Polish Jews.
Source: M. Edelman, P. Sawicka, I była miłość w getcie, Świat książki, Inowrocław, 2009, p. 27.