Marek Edelman | |
|---|---|
 Edelman at around the time of theWarsaw Ghetto Uprising | |
| Born | 1919 or 1922 |
| Died | (2009-10-02)October 2, 2009 (aged 90 or 87) Warsaw, Poland |
| Buried | |
| Allegiance |  General Jewish Labour Bund Żydowska Organizacja Bojowa Armia Ludowa |
| Years of service | 1942–1944 |
| Rank | Deputy commander (ŻOB) |
| Battles / wars | |
| Awards | French Legion of Honor[1][2] Order of the White Eagle[1] Yale University,honorary doctorate[1] |
Marek Edelman (Yiddish:מאַרעק עדעלמאַן; 1919 or 1922 – October 2, 2009) was a Polish political and social activist andcardiologist. As aJew, Edelman was the last surviving leader of theWarsaw Ghetto Uprising. Long before his death, he was the last one to stay in thePolish People's Republic despite harassment by thePolish United Workers' Party authorities.[3]
BeforeWorld War II, he was aGeneral Jewish Labour Bund activist. During the war he co-founded theJewish Combat Organization (ŻOB). He took part in the 1943 Warsaw Ghetto Uprising, becoming its leader after the death ofMordechaj Anielewicz. He also took part in the 1944Warsaw Uprising.[4]
After the war, Edelman remained in Poland and became a noted cardiologist. From the 1970s, he collaborated with theWorkers' Defence Committee and other political groups opposing the regime's rulingPZRP party. As a member ofSolidarity, he took part in thePolish Round Table Talks of 1989. Following the peaceful transformations of 1989, he was a member of various centrist and liberal parties.[5] He also wrote books documenting the history of wartime resistance against theNazi Germanoccupation of Poland.[6]
Details of Marek Edelman's birth are not known for certain; sources give two possible years of birth, either 1919 inHomel (present-dayBelarus),[7][8] or in 1922 inWarsaw.[1] His father, Natan Feliks Edelman (died 1924), was a member of theSocialist Revolutionary Party (his father's brothers, also Socialist Revolutionaries, were executed by theBolsheviks).[7] His mother, Cecylia Edelman (died 1934), a hospital secretary, was an activist member of theGeneral Jewish Labour Bund, a Jewishsocialistworkers' party.[7] When Edelman's mother Cecylia died, he was 14 years old, and was looked after by other staff members at the hospital where she had worked in Warsaw, the city he always called home.[9] He said in 2001: "Warsaw is my city. It is here that I learned Polish,Yiddish and German. It is here that at school, I learned one must always take care of others. It is also here that I was slapped in the face just because I was a Jew."[9]
As a child, Edelman was a member ofSotsyalistishe Kinder Farband (SKIF), theJewish Labour Bund's youth group for children.[10]
In 1939 he joined and became a leader inTsukunft (Future), the Bund's youth organization for older children.[11] During the war, he restarted these organizations inside the Warsaw Ghetto.[12]
The defiance and organization of the Bund made their mark on Edelman. As conditions forJews worsened in the 1930s, Bund members preferred to challenge the mountingantisemitism rather than flee. Edelman later said: "The Bundists did not wait forthe Messiah, nor did they plan to leave forPalestine. They believed that Poland was their country, and they fought for a just, socialist Poland in which each nationality would have its own cultural autonomy, and in which minorities' rights would be guaranteed."[9]
In 1939, after theGerman invasion of Poland Edelman found himself confined—along with the other Jews of Warsaw—to theWarsaw Ghetto. In 1942, as a Bund youth leader he co-founded the undergroundJewish Combat Organization (Żydowska Organizacja Bojowa, ŻOB). In the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising of April–May 1943, led byMordechaj Anielewicz, Edelman was one of the three sub-commanders and then became the leader after the death of Anielewicz.[13]
When the Germans had stopped their campaign of transporting Ghetto residents toTreblinka extermination camp in September 1942, only 60,000 had remained.[9] Edelman and his comrades, however, had had little doubt that the Germans would resume the job. The Jewish Combat Organisation had begun acquiring weapons and organizing into units that would make up for lack of training and munitions with an intimate knowledge of the ghetto, both above ground and in its sewer network.[9]
The Germans resumed their attack on the ghetto on April 19, 1943, with over 2,000 troops. According to Edelman: "The Germans weren't expecting resistance of any kind, let alone that we would take up arms." The outnumbered and outgunned Ghetto fighters' strong resistance forced the German troops to withdraw.[9] It was on the second day of the Uprising, while protecting the retreat of Edelman and other comrades, that another prominent insurgent andBundist,Michał Klepfisz, was killed.[14] Over the next three weeks, the fighting was intense. The Jewish fighters killed and wounded scores of Nazis but inevitably sustained far greater losses. On May 8, ŻOB's commander,Mordechaj Anielewicz, was surrounded by German forces. Anielewicz died during the final assault on the ŻOB's bunker on 8 May 1943, which meant that now Edelman was in charge. "After three weeks," he recalled, "most of us were dead."[9]
The Germans proceeded to flush out the few remaining fighters by burning down the ghetto - Edelman always insisted, "We were beaten by the flames, not the Germans."[9] At that juncture, couriers from the Polish underground outside the ghetto came through the sewers that still linked it with the rest of Warsaw.[15] On the morning of May 10, Edelman and his few remaining comrades escaped through the sewers and made their way to the non-Ghetto part of Warsaw to find safety among their Polish compatriots. At this point the Uprising was over and the fate of those fighters who had remained behind is unknown.[9]
After World War II, the Ghetto Uprising was sometimes given as an unusual instance of active Jewish resistance in the face of the horror perpetrated by the Germans. However, Marek never saw a difference in the character of those who fought in the Uprising and those who were sent to the death camps, as, in his view, all involved were simply dealing with an inevitable death as well as they knew how.[9]
"We knew perfectly well that we had no chance of winning. We fought simply not to allow the Germans alone to pick the time and place of our deaths. We knew we were going to die. Just like all the others who were sent toTreblinka.... Their death was far more heroic. We didn't know when we would take a bullet. They had to deal with certain death, stripped naked in a gas chamber or standing at the edge of a mass grave waiting for a bullet in the back of the head.... It was easier to die fighting than in agas chamber."[9]
In mid-1944, Edelman, as a member of the leftistArmia Ludowa (People's Army), participated in the citywideWarsaw Uprising, when Polish forces rose up against the Germans before being forced to surrender after 63 days of fighting.[16] After the capitulation, Edelman together with a group of other ŻOB fighters, hid out in the ruins of the city as one of theRobinson Crusoes of Warsaw before being rescued and evacuated with the help of the centristArmia Krajowa (Home Army).[17]
Edelman's hospital upbringing had proven invaluable in the Warsaw Ghetto. After World War II, he studied atŁódź Medical School and became a notedcardiologist who invented an original life-saving operation.[18] In 1948, Edelman actively opposed the incorporation of theBund into thePolish United Workers' Party (Poland'sCommunist party), which led to the Communists disbanding the organization.[19] In 1976, he became an activist with theWorkers' Defence Committee (Komitet Obrony Robotników)[20] and later with theSolidarity movement.[16] Edelman publicly denouncedracism and promotedhuman rights.[13]
In 1981, when GeneralWojciech Jaruzelski declaredmartial law, Edelman was interned by the government.[16] In 1983, he refused to take part in the official celebrations of the 40th anniversary of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising sponsored by Poland'sCommunist government.[21]
In an open letter dated February 2, 1983, he wrote of his refusal of invitation:
Forty years ago we fought not only for our lives. We fought for life in dignity and freedom. To celebrate our anniversary there where social life is dominated throughout by humiliation and coercion would be to deny our fight.
Hanna Krall, "Shielding the Flame"
A couple of days before the official event, on April 17, 1983, several hundredSolidarity members staged a commemoration of their own, gathering spontaneously at the Warsaw Ghetto Memorial. Edelman was then prevented from being present at this occasion because he was being held under house arrest back inLodz. Edelman sat in his house surrounded by the police cars, at a table set for a fancy dinner which included empty places because the police were not letting the guests in, except the journalistHanna Krall.[22]
Edelman was a lifelonganti-Zionist.[23][24][25] In a 1985 interview, he said Zionism was a "lost cause" and questionedIsrael's viability.[26] He remained firmly Polish, refusing to emigrate to Israel.[27] In his old age, Edelman spoke in defence of thePalestinian people, as he felt that the Jewish self-defence for which he had fought was in danger of crossing the line into oppression.[28]
Inpost-Communist Poland, Edelman was a member of several centristliberal parties: theCitizens' Movement for Democratic Action,Democratic Union,Freedom Union andDemocratic Party – demokraci.pl. He supported the1999 NATO bombing of Yugoslavia as well as the2003 Iraq war, both of which he saw as instances ofAmerican democracy saving countries fromfascism again.[29][30][31] On April 17, 1998,[32] Edelman was awarded Poland's highest decoration, theOrder of the White Eagle.[1] He also received the FrenchLegion of Honour.[2]
Edelman lent public support toanti-fascist initiatives and to organisations combattingantisemitism. In 1993, he accompanied a convoy of goods into the city ofSarajevo while thatcity was under siege.[33] Edelman strongly condemned international indifference during theBosnian Genocide in the early 1990s, calling it a disgrace for the rest of Europe and "a delayed victory byHitler – a victory from the grave."[34][35]
In August 2002, Edelman wrote an open letter to the Palestinian resistance leaders. Although the letter criticised thePalestinian suicide attacks, its tone infuriated the Israeli government and press. According to the late British writer and activistPaul Foot, "He wrote [the letter] in a spirit of solidarity from a fellow resistance fighter, as a former leader of a Jewish uprising not dissimilar in desperation to the Palestinian uprising in theoccupied territories."[36] He addressed his letter "To all the leaders of Palestinian military, paramilitary and guerrilla organizations – To all the soldiers of Palestinian militant groups."[37]
Marek Edelman was married toAlina Margolis-Edelman (1922–2008). They had two children, Aleksander and Anna.[2][27] When his wife and children emigrated from Poland to France in the wake of the1968 Polish political crisis and antisemitic actions by the Polish Communist authorities, Edelman decided to stay inŁódź. "Someone had to stay here with all those who perished here, after all."[9] He published his memoirs, which have been translated into six languages.[27] Each April he laid flowers in Warsaw for those he had served with in the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising.[2] Edelman's wife Alina, likewise a Warsaw Ghetto survivor, died in 2008. They were survived by their son and daughter.[9]
Edelman died on October 2, 2009.[2][13][38] He was buried in Warsaw with fullmilitary honours on October 9, 2009. His coffin was covered with a Bund banner inscribed "Bund - Yidisher Sozialistisher Farband," and a choir sang the Bund anthem, "Di Shvue."[39] The Polish PresidentLech Kaczyński and the former PresidentLech Wałęsa were present at the funeral, attended by about 2,000 persons.[40]
Władysław Bartoszewski, former PolishMinister of Foreign Affairs and an Auschwitz survivor, led the tributes to Edelman, saying: "He reached a good age. He left as a contented man, even if he was always aware of the tragedy he went through."[13][38] Bartoszewski denied that the activist was "irreplaceable," before acknowledging that "there are few people like Marek Edelman."[13][38]Roman Catholic BishopTadeusz Pieronek said: "I respect him most for the fact that he stayed in this land, which made him fight so hard for his Jewish and Polish identity. He became a real witness, he gave a real testimony with his life."[41] The former Polish Prime Minister,Tadeusz Mazowiecki, was also present and said Edelman had been arole model for him.[40]
Former head ofIsrael's parliament and former Israeli ambassador to PolandShevah Weiss said: "I'd like to offer my condolences to Marek Edelman's family, to the Polish nation and to the Jewish nation. He was a hero to all of us."[38] Ian Kelly, official spokesperson for theUnited States Department of State, expressed sympathies and affirmed that the United States "stands with Poland as it mourns the loss of a great man."[42]
In the 2001 television filmUprising, he was portrayed by American actorJohn Ales.
The documentaryMarek Edelman... And There Was Love in the Ghetto, directed byAndrzej Wajda and Jolanta Dylewska, was released in 2019.
