148
IJAlnlSAN IZEVIEW
"other." Under the circumstances, jews didn't W;lI1t
to
join the army which ,
in turn, proved the Poles' stereotype of " the je\V."
After the German invasion of Poland on September \, \
<)3<),
some jews
ned
to Russian territories. In 13ransk, some Poles helped hide jews; many
others followed orders which incl uded hauling the corpses of jews the
Germans had shot
to
a Illass grave. Hoffillan probes into the total lack of sen–
timent by the farmer who related this particular incident to her so many
years later. She infers that it is impossibl e to tdl to what cxtent his action was
based on previous preconceptions and prcjudiccs and to what extent he
turned earlier resentments into the knowledge th:1t anything at all was per–
mi tted when it came to jews, incl uding murder. Yet she immediately
balances this tale by focusing on "a slllall island of opposition," on the phar–
macist who nude a hiding place behind piles of lumber for the Shapiro
fami ly and did not all ow herself
to
know that she might be killed for this
deed of mercy. When she was interrogated by the Gestapo in the presence
of a doctor, a priest and a teacher, she denied her "colllpli city," and none of
the others gave her away.
After the Germans in 13ransk were again rcplaccd by the Soviet arm y,
old and divergent viewpoints re-emerged : the R.ussians were the Poles' tra–
ditional enemy, but for the jews they were liberators . The communi sts and
other le ftists among them actively welcomed the Soviet occupation–
although some soon wou ld be upset by the "nationalization" of "bourgeois"
property. But before long, placards of Hitler and Stalin embracing were post–
ed everywhere, and a number of jews-along wi th dissenting Poles-were
deported to Siberia. Gradually, an uneasy calm settled over 13ransk which,
however, came to an abrupt end with Hitler's attack on the Soviet Union
and the Germans' takeover. The all-too f.1llliliar Nazi laws were enacted, and
in the fall of
1<)·t\
the jews of 13ransk and surrounding villages were herded
into an overcrowded ghetto. A year later, orders clInc to liquidate it. Then,
some Polish policemen shot jewish children; others delivered jews to the
Gestapo; yet others scarched for jews. A fcw C hri stians buried twenty-three
jews in the jewish cellletery. In the end, only a fl'w 13ransk jews survived;
they had taken ofF to the woods, had joincd small jcwish or Polish resistance
groups or had becn hidden by Poles. After the Soviet army left 13ransk in
january \
<)45,
sixty-t()llr je\Vish survivors emerged fi'oln hiding. They were
aware of the lawlessness and disarray and reali zed that f;lrIners who had
moved into their f()rIller homes were ,Iti'aid they might reclaim them. After
two j ewish women were killed, most of thc survivors decided to move
to
13ialystok or to emigrate to the United States and Isr3cl.
Trying to m,lke sense of the wealth of inf()rI:lation she has gathered,
Hoffinan focLiscs on the psychological effects of the war and of the Nazi
occupation-when "ordinary decency ;md compassions were criminalized
