![A column of prisoners arrives at the Belzec killing center. [LCID: 51560]](https://encyclopedia.ushmm.org/images/large/cb08455b-a8ed-4a90-ac66-4cc5376e09dd.jpg)
A column of prisoners arrives at the Belzec killing center. Belzec, Poland, ca. 1942.
In early 1940 the Germans set up a forced-labor camp for Jewish prisoners in Belzec. The inmates were forced to build fortifications and dig anti-tank ditches along the demarcation line between Germany and Soviet-occupied Poland. The camp was closed down at the end of 1940. The following year, in November 1941, construction began on the Belzec killing center.
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