Last surviving fighter in 1943 Warsaw Ghetto Uprising dies
PR dla Zagranicy
Grzegorz Siwicki
23.12.2018 00:10
The last surviving fighter in the 1943 Warsaw Ghetto Uprising has died, the Polish embassy in Tel Aviv has said.
![Simcha Rotem “Kazik” Ratajzer, pictured in 2013. Photo: Adrian Grycuk [CC BY-SA 3.0 pl (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/pl/deed.en)], from Wikimedia Commons](http://external.polskieradio.pl/files/4e6fb6ad-3b54-4712-b1eb-b5e18e73fffd.file "Simcha Rotem “Kazik” Ratajzer, pictured in 2013. Photo: Adrian Grycuk [CC BY-SA 3.0 pl (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/pl/deed.en)], from Wikimedia Commons")
Simcha Rotem “Kazik” Ratajzer, pictured in 2013. Photo: Adrian Grycuk [CC BY-SA 3.0 pl (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/pl/deed.en)], from Wikimedia Commons
Simcha Rotem “Kazik” Ratajzer, who also fought in the 1944 Warsaw Uprising by Poles against their Nazi German occupiers, died on Saturday in Jerusalem at the age of 94.
Born in Warsaw in 1924, he was a “hero of two nations, Poland and Israel,” the Polish President’s Office tweeted.
The Warsaw Ghetto Uprising broke out on April 19, 1943, with insurgents holding out for close to a month, until the revolt was finally crushed on May 16.
It is estimated that about 13,000 Jews died in the ghetto during the revolt. It had been the largest ghetto created by the Germans on Polish soil. The majority of the captured survivors were transported to death camps.
Some surviving Jewish combatants later fought in the Warsaw Uprising, launched by Poland's underground Home Army (AK) on August 1, 1944.
(gs)
Source: IAR, prezydent.pl