Misplaced Pages

Yitzhak Wittenberg (Yiddish: איציק װיטנבערג, Hebrew: יצחק ויטנברג; 1907 – 16 July 1943) was a Jewish resistance fighter in Vilnius during World War II. He was a member of the Communist Party. He was the commander of the Fareynikte Partizaner Organizatsye (FPO), a resistance group in the Vilna Ghetto which was preparing an uprising should the final moments of the ghetto come. When the Germans learned about the existence of a Communist, Wittenberg, in the ghetto, they made a request to the head of the Jewish council, Jacob Gens, that Wittenberg should be surrendered to them. Gens betrayed Wittenberg to the police who arrested him, but he was freed by young FPO fighters. Subsequently, Gens insisted that Wittenberg surrender. Feeling he did not have the support of the ghetto for an uprising and fearing a massacre, he surrendered.

Some accounts say that he was later found dead in his prison cell having swallowed poison; others say that his mutilated body was found the next day. It has been speculated that Gens slipped the poison to Wittenberg. The Wittenberg affair was discussed in the Eichmann trial. The story of his death is told in the song Yitzhak Wittenberg.

References

1. Bartrop, Paul R.; Dickerman, Michael (2017-09-15). The Holocaust: An Encyclopedia and Document Collection [4 volumes]. ABC-CLIO. ISBN 9781440840845.
2. "United States Holocaust Memorial Museum".
3. "Yad Vashem".
4. Asael Lubotzky, Not My Last Journey, Yedioth Ahronoth, 2017, pages 85-86.
5. Halik, Kochanski (2013). The eagle unbowed : Poland and the Poles in the Second World War. Penguin. ISBN 9781846143588. OCLC 849065604.
6. "RESISTANCE IN THE VILNA GHETTO". Archived from the original on 2012-08-16. Retrieved 2020-04-24.
7. Lester, David (2005). Suicide and the Holocaust. Nova Publishers. p. 7. ISBN 978-1-59454-427-9.
8. Hilberg, Raul (1985). The destruction of the European Jews (Student ed.). New York. ISBN 0841909105. OCLC 12421088.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
9. "Eichmann trial - The District Court Sessions". 2011-07-17. Archived from the original on 2011-07-17. Retrieved 2020-04-24.
10. ""Itsik Vitnberg" | Music of the Holocaust".
11. "How Did Itzik Wittenberg, Hero of the Vilna Ghetto, Die?". 24 April 2017.

External links

• The Wittenberg Affair Archived 2011-10-07 at the Wayback Machine
• Resistance in the Vilna Ghetto
• Song about Wittenberg
• How Did Itzik Wittenberg, Hero of the Vilna Ghetto, Die?, Menachem Kaiser, April 24, 2017

• Judaism
• Lithuania

• 1907 births
• 1943 suicides
• 1943 deaths
• Jewish resistance members during the Holocaust
• People who died in the Vilna Ghetto
• People who died by suicide in prison custody
• Suicides by poison
• Soviet civilians killed in World War II
• Jewish Lithuanian history
• Suicides by Jews during the Holocaust
• Lithuanian communists
• Lithuanian Jews who died in the Holocaust
• Suicides in Lithuania