During the German occupation, Maria Potężna and her teenage son Tadeusz lived in Borysław near Lwów. From 1941, when the city was occupied by the Germans, they helped their Jewish neighbours, the Weiss family. They provided them with shelter, organised hiding places in other locations, and delivered food.
After the war, Szewach Weiss, who was saved with the help of the Potężny family, became an Israeli politician and diplomat. From 2001 to 2003, he served as the Ambassador of the State of Israel in Poland.
“Little Szewach, still Szejwach at the time, wanted to live. I wanted my family to survive – that was all. And then I no longer had a childhood. I was small, young, a child with an old head. At the age of nine, In order to help my parents, I began trading in saccharin, soap and vodka”, said Szewach Weiss in an interview for the POLIN Museum in 2014. “I didn’t have a childhood. I don’t remember toys. Not only me, but my entire generation.”
The fates of the Weiss and Potężny families before the war and in the first years of Soviet and German occupations
Before the war, the Weiss family lived in Borysław, on the corner ul. Hołówka and ul. Zielona in the Dolna Wolanka district. Meir (Majer) Wolf Weiss graduated from a commercial school in nearby Drohobycz. Together with his wife Gitla (Gienia), he ran a grocery store in Borysław. They had three children – Aaron (born in 1928), Mila (born in 1930) and Szejwach (born in 1935).
The Weiss family’s neighbours were Maria Potężna and her son Tadeusz. Maria’s husband had died in an accident, while working in the oil fields in Borysław, when Tadeusz was five-years-old. Her second husband went to war in 1939 and never returned.
On 1st July 1941, when the Germans entered Borysław, pushing out the Soviets, brutal repressions began against the Jewish community. On 8th August 1942, the Germans established two ghettos in the city. They organised round-ups of Jews who, as the situation worsened, tried to find safe hiding places. Among them was the Weiss family.
Under a blanket, behind a wardrobe and in the basement - the Weiss family hiding with the help of the Potężna family and other individuals
At first, the Weiss family, like other Jews from Borysław, were locked inside a ghetto. They managed to escape and the first days, after their escape, were spent in the home of Anna and Michał Góral. During the second German raid, the Weiss family hid with the Potężny family. Szewach was hidden in Maria’s bed, under a blanket, and his sister was hidden under the bed in Tadeusz’s room.
“To this day, I still remember how Mrs. Potężna brought me a glass of warm milk, while I was hiding under the bed... She was such a beautiful, kind woman. She knew that I was scared. I was the youngest, only six-year-old at the time. I still remember the taste of that milk and her hands when she patted me. After that, she helped us until the end of the war”, recalled Szewach Weiss.
During the third raid, the Weiss family was, once again, helped by Anna and Michał Góral, who provided them with shelter in a stable and barn and, later, in a small chapel.
Then, for about eight months, the Weiss family – Majer, Gitla, their three children, their cousin Hinda, her husband and son, as well as their neighbour Bachman – hid behind a double wall in a hiding place, which had been prepared by Majer.
Their house was then occupied by a Ukrainian woman, Julia Lasotowa (née Szczepaniuk), who had taken over their store. The hiding place was located behind wardrobes, between the wall of the store and the wall of the warehouse. It was no wider than sixty centimetres, but it was high enough to allow several bunks to be stacked one above the other.
In this situation, Julia Lasotowa and her husband, Roman Szczepaniuk, aided the Weiss family by bringing them food and the essentials which they needed. Those hiding had to remain silent at all times, as the Lasotowas’ son, who served in the Ukrainian police which was collaborating with the Germans, was unaware of the hiding place.
For the next twenty-one months, the Weiss family hid in the basement of an orphanage building. They were familiar with the building – before the war, Szewach Weiss’s grandfather, a mason by trade, had built it.
The entrance to the basement, a hole dug in the wall, was carefully concealed by a washbasin hanging on a nail. Mrs. Lasotowa provided them with food, while Tadeusz Potężny helped with daily tasks – delivering food, fuel for the stove and removing waste. Communication occurred through a basement window:
“The orphanage basement had three sections – a laundry room, a coal storage and some kind of small room. One could move from one to another through a very small entrance, blocked by equipment, which did a good job of concealing the hideout”, recalled Tadeusz Potężny.
The conditions in the basement did not allow the people, hiding there, to straighten up. Inside, it was cold and damp. Majer Weiss, who began to develop tuberculosis at that time, snored at night, so the children took turns on night shifts to wake their father in case of any revealing noise. Silence was especially necessary during the day when the orphanage held lessons for the children. Food was prepared on a small stove. The daily meal usually consisted of soup made from a single potato. Drinking water was collected from the walls using a cloth.
Silence was especially crucial during the day when lessons were conducted for the orphanage children. Food was prepared on a small stove. The daily meal usually consisted of a soup made from a single potato. Drinking water was collected by wiping the walls with a cloth.
The Weiss family also faced direct danger. Szewach Weiss recalled how, one night, one of their neighbours came to the basement and demanded money from those in hiding. Szewach’s father took a knife in his hand and scared the intruder away.
“In Borysław, we went through terrible things. Everything which happened to the Jews there, I saw with my own eyes. The Germans and Ukrainians murdered almost all the Jews from the town, including my extended family. That my immediate family and I survived, because we met good people like the Ukrainian lady, Mrs. Lasotowa, and the two Polish women – Mrs. Potężna and Mrs. Góral, who helped us survive those horrible times, was nothing short of a miracle”, recalled Szewach Weiss.
Wałbrzych and Haifa – the post-war fates of the surviving Weiss family, as well as Maria and Tadeusz Potężny
After the Red Army took over Borysław in August 1944, the Weiss family returned to their home. However, they quickly decided to leave the city which, as the result of the post-war shift of Poland’s eastern border, found itself in the USSR.
For a short time, the Weiss family lived in Wałbrzych, where Szewach attended a school at an orphanage run by the Zionist organization Bricha. In early 1946, the family crossed the border into Czechoslovakia and, via Austria and Italy, made their way to Palestine.
There, Szewach enrolled in an agricultural school. He excelled in sports, particularly athletics and weightlifting, served in the military, studied political science at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem and law in Tel Aviv. In 1975, he founded the Department of Media at the University of Haifa. That same year, he became a professor at the university.
He became involved in politics as a member of the Labour Party. From 1969, he served as a Haifa city councillor and, from 1981, as a member of the Knesset (the Israeli parliament). Between 1988 and 1992, he was the deputy speaker and, from 1992 to 1996, he served as the speaker of the Knesset. In 1993, he participated in the Israeli-Palestinian peace talks in Oslo, which led to the signing of the Oslo Accords. From 2000, he was been chairman of the Yad Vashem Institute Council.
From 2001 to 2003, he served as the Ambassador of the State of Israel to Poland. For his contribution towards the development of Polish-Israeli cooperation, he was awarded the Grand Cross of the Order of Merit of the Republic of Poland by the President of Poland, as well as the Order of the White Eagle.
After the war, Maria and Tadeusz Potężni settled in Wałbrzych.
Honouring the Poles and Ukrainians with the title of “Righteous Among the Nations”
“[...] A person doesn’t need to be a hero, just human being – just like ordinary women, Mrs. Góralowa, Mrs. Potężna or Mrs. Lasotowa, who hid us in Borysław. When we talk about heroism, they were the true heroines. Or my father, my mother and everyone who stayed with their children until the very last moment”, said Szewach Weiss.
On 4th March 2001, the Yad Vashem Institute in Jerusalem honoured Maria Potężna and her son Tadeusz with the title of “Righteous Among the Nations”. The medal and honorary diploma were presented to Tadeusz, during a ceremony in Wałbrzych, by the then Ambassador of Israel, Szewach Weiss, a Holocaust survivor.
“For me, after so many years, this reunion is something extraordinary. What a pity that my parents are no longer alive! I would have invited them so they could also meet Tadeusz”, said Szewach Weiss during the ceremony.
“I am proud that Szewach is now a respected man”, said Tadeusz Potężny.
Earlier, on 28th May 2000, the title of “Righteous Among the Nations” was also bestowed upon Julia Lasotowa and Roman Szczepaniuk, as well as Anna and Michał Góral.
