Germany occupied Kovno, Lithuania on June 24, 1941. Within six months, German Einsatzgruppe detachments and Lithuanian collaborations had murdered half of all the Jews in Kovno. Between July and August 15, 1941, German authorities concentrated some 29,000 of Kovno's Jews into a ghetto.
Despite enormous obstacles, many Jews throughout German-occupied Europe attempted armed resistance against the Germans. Individual Jews or groups of Jews engaged in planned or spontaneous opposition to the Germans and their allies. Jewish partisans were especially active in the east, where they fought the Germans from bases established behind the front lines in forests and ghettos. Because antisemitism was widespread there, they found little support among the surrounding population. Even so, as many as 20,000 Jews fought the Germans in the forests of eastern Europe.
Item View
We would like to thank Crown Family Philanthropies, Abe and Ida Cooper Foundation, the Claims Conference, EVZ, and BMF for supporting the ongoing work to create content and resources for the Holocaust Encyclopedia. View the list of donor acknowledgement.
