ABSTRACT
On June 22, 1941, Germany launched Operation Barbarossa, breaking its nonaggression pact with the Soviet Union and pushing the Soviet army out of Polish territory into Soviet Russia. It was also at this time, as noted in Chapter 2, that the Nazis escalated their murderous campaign against the Jews and moved toward implementing their Final Solution to the “Jewish problem.” Once again, the German propaganda machine blamed the Jews: “The German Armies in order to defend itself [sic] against Soviet aggression was forced to cross the borders into the Polish territory occupied by the Soviets. The bastardly Jewish warmongers in Moscow and London have forced this war on the German people.”1 In Krosno, random raids and deportations became more common. As my father recalled, “People were executed in open daylight on city streets. No German offi cial needed any justifi cation for killing non-German civilians. Each dispensed justice according to his own mood or whim.” In May 1942, as the Final Solution was fully underway, the Gestapo ordered the creation of the Krosno ghetto in a one-block area that had been used as an egg and poultry market known as the “egg place.” Alexander White, a survivor from Krosno, estimates that about 4,000 Jews, whose ranks had been swelled by refugees from other villages and towns, were ordered into the ghetto.2 A gate patrolled by armed guards
regulated movement in and out of the area, and Jews needed a special permit or work order to leave. The Berger family received a temporary reprieve from the relocation order because the Nazis still valued their tailoring services and allowed them to remain in their home.
