68th anniversary of the founding of the “Żegota”
The Żegota was founded as a result of the transformation of the Temporary Committee to Aid Jews, created in September 1942 on the initiative of Zofia Kossak-Szczucka and Wanda Krahelska-Filipowiczowa.
The main task of the Żegota was to provide help for Jews inside the ghettos and outside of them. The organization was able to function thanks to the funds from the Polish government-in-exile and the funds collected among its supporters in Poland and abroad.
The name of the organization was invented by Zofia Kossak-Szczucka – it derives from the name of one of the conspirators from the 3rd part of “Dziady” by Adam Mickiewicz.
The first chairman of Żegota was the politician of the Polish Socialist Party Julian Grobelny.
Among members of the organization were members of the Democratic Party, the Bund, the People’s Party, the Front of Poland’s Liberation and the Jewish National Committee.
Żegota helped Jews find shelter at the houses of Polish families, in orphanages, convents and other institutions of this kind. It also provided the underground press with materials and information devoted to the extermination of Jews.
The Warsaw unit of Żegota, lead by Irena Sendler who was later honored for her activity with the title “Righteous Among the Nations”, took care of 2.5 thousand Jewish children secretly lead out of the Warsaw Ghetto.
In cooperation with monasteries, Żegota provided Jews with Catholic birth certificates. That way the organization managed to organize over 50 thousand false documents. Material support was ensured to 4 thousand people. The Żegota also tried to provide the Jews with medical care.
Here is how one of the most famous members of the Żegota, Władysław Bartoszewski described the activity of the organization: “(…) representatives of competent, reliable Jewish political organizations of various inclinations, often at variance with themselves, together with representatives of democratic centers of the Polish underground movement, jointly took action to save people, warn them, collect materials concerning the Nazi crimes and contact the free world. It is a phenomenon I do not know from any other country in the occupied Europe”.
The Yad Vashem Institute honored the Żegota with the medal “Righteous Among the Nations” and its members were commemorated with a tree in the Alley of the Righteous in Yad Vashem.
